# Reading Shakespeare **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 30, 2003, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033 "2003-11-30T07:29:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Iamb\_Fake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/8c91f0/32.png) [@Iamb\_Fake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Iamb_Fake)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/1 "2003-11-30T07:29:17Z")
I was just wondering if anyone reads Shakespeare for pleasure? ---
**Author:** ![UnwrittenNocturne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/6de8d8/32.png) [@UnwrittenNocturne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UnwrittenNocturne)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 7:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/2 "2003-11-30T07:34:12Z")
Yes, partiularly the sonnets. What can I say, I love his imagery ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 7:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/3 "2003-11-30T07:42:35Z")
I do. I especially enjoy Hamlet: The Dane may have been somewhat on the indecisive side, but when it finally counted he got his act together and kicked major ass. Plus, you’ll not find a better piece of angst than his main soliloquy: “Teenage Wasteland” indeed. Plus, he wrote more than plays. His sonnets, for example, are widely held as examples of the beauty of Modern English. Along with Burns and Joyce, Shakespeare makes me extremely glad to speak Modern English as my mother tongue. As an aside, since Shakespeare’s works are now in the public domain, you can download them gratis from [Project Gutenberg](http://promo.net/pg/). PG is a great source for plain-text (ASCII and simple HTML) full versions of classic pieces of literature. (All of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories are there, as well as Lewis Carroll’s Alice stories. Plus more.) ---
**Author:** ![Katisha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bcef8e/32.png) [@Katisha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katisha)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 7:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/4 "2003-11-30T07:44:35Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Derleth \* > **Plus, you’ll not find a better piece of angst than his main soliloquy: “Teenage Wasteland” indeed.** No, that’s Romeo and Juliet. Who also die before they get old. 😉 I read Shakespeare for business _and_ pleasure. Mmmmmmm…Shakespeare… ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 7:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/5 "2003-11-30T07:58:23Z")
**Katisha** : Hamlet may have been older than 19, but he was acting every inch the teen when he spoke those lines. The Dour Dane was kept at an adolescent level by Claudius usurping the throne. It took the events of the play to bring him up to adulthood. Plus, he also died before he got old. Nyah! 😛 BTW, _Romeo and Juliet_ is best read as a comedy in the modern sense, in that it’s so over-the-top that I can’t help but laugh at the yahoos. To steal from another play, “What fools these mortals be!” ---
**Author:** ![eli\_the\_fanatic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ccd318/32.png) [@eli\_the\_fanatic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eli_the_fanatic)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/6 "2003-11-30T08:11:21Z")
Hamlet was 33 in the play. ---
**Author:** ![Atreyu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@Atreyu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atreyu)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 10:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/7 "2003-11-30T10:37:06Z")
I’ve got a book of the complete collected works for Shakespeare, and I’ve read his works for pleasure often. Some of the sonnets, but particularly the tragedies. _Macbeth_ is my personal favorite. ---
**Author:** ![TV\_time](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f17d59/32.png) [@TV\_time](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TV_time)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/8 "2003-11-30T14:50:01Z")
I do. But you must remember I spent a good number of years in the theater. I will pick up one of my collection of Shakespeare plays and mentally work out some staging or casting or adapting that I think would be a fun (or an exciting) presentation. My wife refers to it as my being “lost in the 17th century,” which is a bit untrue because sometimes some of my mental reenactments move well into the future. TV ---
**Author:** ![Leechboy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9fc348/32.png) [@Leechboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leechboy)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/9 "2003-11-30T16:16:50Z")
I’m a big reader of not only Shakespeare, but also Webster, Ford, Johnson, Kyd et al. There was more than one good playwrite around back then. I’m especially fond of Kyd’s 1603 version of the Spanish Tragedy, with additions by Ben Johnson. In particular the added section between III.xiii and III.xiv (Otherwise known as the “painting a sorrow” scene) ---
**Author:** ![Krisfer\_the\_Cat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Krisfer\_the\_Cat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Krisfer_the_Cat)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/10 "2003-11-30T17:16:24Z")
I havent read them for awhile, but as a shy, mousy teen in the 80s I read several of the plays. Most of **Asimov’s Guide to Shakespeare** and watched the PBS productions over and over. ---
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/11 "2003-11-30T18:09:54Z")
Well, I did before I started reading him for business. (I still _watch_ the plays for pleasure – the student production of _The Two Gentlemen of Verona_ that I saw last weekend was absolutely hilarious – but one of the unfortunate side effects of grad school is that it makes your fluff reading a great deal more fluffy.) A few nitpicks, 'cos I just can’t help myself: Hamlet is 30, not 33. Props to **Leechboy** for mentioning all the other great playwrights from this period, but I’m reliably informed that Ben Jonson turns over in his grave whenever anybody spells his name “Johnson.” ---
**Author:** ![simply\_cats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8c91f0/32.png) [@simply\_cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simply_cats)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/12 "2003-11-30T18:20:46Z")
Does anyone have a cite for Hamlet’s age? I’ve never noticed it in the play, and have always assumed he was in his late teens/early twenties. Thanks, amigos 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![eli\_the\_fanatic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ccd318/32.png) [@eli\_the\_fanatic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eli_the_fanatic)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/13 "2003-11-30T19:43:34Z")
Well, for starters, Hamlet says in Act V during the scene with Yorick that the man had been dead 23 years, and that he knew Yorkick well. That alone says that Hamlet is at least 23, and somewhat older if he knew Horatio well. I would think this passage is famous enough to somewhat set his age. A grave digger in that scene says he has had his job 30 years and that he started the day Hamlet was born. He might have been estimating. I no longer recall where I got the number 33 in my head, but for textual evidence in the play 30 (as Fretful P says) is the most defensible answer, although this will not stop scholars from coming to their own conclusions. ---
**Author:** ![eli\_the\_fanatic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ccd318/32.png) [@eli\_the\_fanatic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eli_the_fanatic)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/14 "2003-11-30T19:45:26Z")
Oops, I mean somewhat older if he knew YORICK well. How I wish the edit button worked. ---
**Author:** ![merrily](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@merrily](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/merrily)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2003, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/15 "2003-11-30T20:35:12Z")
oh, my, yes. Being a little obsessive, I once set myself to read through all of them. I made it, except for Merry Wives of Windsor–the lisp defeated me. The lesser known ones were great fun. I really liked Pericles. I find that I now like the ones the most that I’ve seen great productions of. That way I can read for joy, and recapture a thrill. Not really fair to the plays, but there it is. I wonder how many people got the Webster gag in Shakespeare in Love? ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_Wright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@Steve\_Wright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_Wright)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2003, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/16 "2003-12-01T01:34:35Z")
Yes, I read Shakespeare … but when it comes to the plays, I’d much rather _watch_ Shakespeare. They’re definitely meant to be watched. (Not all plays are … some of Ibsen’s are specifically written for publication in book form … but you just _know_ Shakespeare is meant to be stagedd… ) ---
**Author:** ![SpoilerVirgin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4491bb/32.png) [@SpoilerVirgin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SpoilerVirgin)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2003, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/17 "2003-12-01T02:11:23Z")
I’d rather watch the plays than read them, although occasionally I see more in the reading than I have in the stage version. I remember crying the first time I read Hamlet’s first soliloquy, although I’d seen the play before and hadn’t been affected in quite the same way. I do love to read the sonnets – I probably pull out my book of them about once a month. ---
**Author:** ![Katisha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bcef8e/32.png) [@Katisha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katisha)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2003, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/18 "2003-12-01T03:24:41Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by merrily \* > \*\*I wonder how many people got the Webster gag in Shakespeare in Love? \*\* That’s how you spot English majors when watching that movie in mixed company: they’re the ones who laugh at it. 😉 (My adviser at U of Chicago told me that the boatman’s line about writing poetry is a reference to John Taylor the Water Poet – talk about obscure…) ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2003, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/19 "2003-12-01T03:29:50Z")
I read Willie S. for pleasure because only Marlowe comes close to the sheer music of his language, but, yes, his plays are meant to be seen in performance. It’s like admiring a suit of clothes on a mannequin and watching them worn by a beautiful model. Moreover, the nuances of direction and performance definitely enhance the meaning and power of Shakespeare’s words. For example, _Titus Andronicus_ has always been, to me at least, an inchoate work that is clearly the work of an inexperienced writer. But the film directed by Julie Tatmor just amazed me with its daring and sheer audacity to not flinch from the horror of the text–and as great as Anthony Hopkins, Jessica Lange, and Alan Cumming were, Harry Lennix’s performance as Aaron the Moor knocked me on my ass. ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2003, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033/20 "2003-12-01T03:31:40Z")
Ta **y** mor, dammit [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reading-shakespeare/216033.md?page=2)