# What's the Big Deal About Shakespeare? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 11, 2019, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839 "2019-05-11T22:43:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Brayne\_Ded](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Brayne\_Ded](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brayne_Ded)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2019, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/61 "2019-05-16T08:22:55Z")
> [@Baker](#): > > I hated Shakespeare when in high school. I too wondered what was the big deal. We were poorly taught, only reading the plays, not even out loud. Never saw a performance. One teacher wanted to take us to see the 1968. Whiting/Hussey version, and some parents nixed it because of a brief flash of Romeos butt, and a one-half second flash of Juliets breast. Probably the best R&J ever. The worst? Gwynneth Paltrow in Shakespeare in love. He might have been, but she certainly wasn’t. Of course, Juliet, along with Shaw’s Saint Joan, is the favorite role for drama queens. I saw several Shakespeare plays performed by a high school. The director was an ex-actor. The plays really do come to life if you see them, whether on stage or as a film. By and large, they are too long to make a good film, except Macbeth, which is one of the shortest. ---
**Author:** ![bonzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/45deac/32.png) [@bonzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bonzer)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2019, 6:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/63 "2019-05-18T06:53:24Z")
> [@Horatio\_Hellpop](#): > > Who are the best British upper-class writers of fiction today? Running with the hijack, while I haven’t read any of his stuff, there’s the obvious candidate of [Edward St Aubyn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_St_Aubyn) - most recently of _Patrick Melrose_ fame. He’s undoubtedly both posh and the recipient of much acclaim for his novels. ---
**Author:** ![Morgyn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morgyn/32/3041_2.png) [@Morgyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgyn)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2019, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/64 "2019-05-18T21:58:12Z")
**bonzer**! Good heavens, it’s been a \*long \*time since I’ve seen you post. Welcome back, I hope. ---
**Author:** ![bonzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/45deac/32.png) [@bonzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bonzer)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2019, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/65 "2019-05-18T22:17:25Z")
Umm, while I haven’t been posting as much as in the past - and I was never that prolific in the first place - I’ve never really been on any sort of hiatus. But the shoutout is appreciated. ---
**Author:** ![Morgyn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morgyn/32/3041_2.png) [@Morgyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgyn)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2019, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/66 "2019-05-18T22:40:41Z")
> [@bonzer](#): > > Umm, while I haven’t been posting as much as in the past - and I was never that prolific in the first place - I’ve never really been on any sort of hiatus. > > But the shoutout is appreciated. I just don’t recall having seen you be active of late, is all. I still remember the pub crawl you and many of the Londopers took me on when I came to visit the UK, lo these many years ago. One of the best months of my entire life. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2019, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/67 "2019-05-18T23:13:58Z")
> [@Gyrate](#): > > Jilly Cooper? :eek: My first thought was PD James (not long dead, so counts I think) but turns out she was the daughter of a tax inspector, and solidly middle class. Sebastian Faulks is proper posh, but more the upper end of upper middle class, I think. Same with David Cornwell aka John le Carre. Nicholas Mosely was an actual aristo - albeit not very much like his dad Oswald or brother Max. His stuff is impenetrable to me though, and he was hardly a major novelist anyway. So yeah, if there’s been an upper-class British novelist in recent decades I can’t think who. ---
**Author:** ![Sherrerd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sherrerd/32/8_2.png) [@Sherrerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sherrerd)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2019, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/68 "2019-05-18T23:23:03Z")
> [@Baron\_Greenback](#): > > My first thought was PD James (not long dead, so counts I think) but turns out she was the daughter of a tax inspector, and solidly middle class. > Sebastian Faulks is proper posh, but more the upper end of upper middle class, I think. Same with David Cornwell aka John le Carre. > Nicholas Mosely was an actual aristo - albeit not very much like his dad Oswald or brother Max. His stuff is impenetrable to me though, and he was hardly a major novelist anyway. > So yeah, if there’s been an upper-class British novelist in recent decades I can’t think who. Nancy Mitford, perhaps, if 47 years back counts as ‘recent decades.’ (If the comparison is with Shakespeare, then that is pretty recent.) ---
**Author:** ![Unreconstructed\_Man](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/76d3ee/32.png) [@Unreconstructed\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unreconstructed_Man)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2019, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/69 "2019-05-18T23:37:55Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > As Dr. Porter put it: > > Brush up your Shakespeare > Start quoting him now > Brush up your Shakespeare > And the women you will wow Speaking as someone who loves Shakespeare, wrote tens of thousands of words on his plays at college, and has even performed in a couple of stage productions, I can confirm this is absolutely not true. ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2019, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/70 "2019-05-19T01:42:53Z")
> [@Sherrerd](#): > > Nancy Mitford, perhaps, if 47 years back counts as ‘recent decades.’ > > (If the comparison is with Shakespeare, then that is pretty recent.) Fancy Nancy was published well back into the 1930s. ---
**Author:** ![Sherrerd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sherrerd/32/8_2.png) [@Sherrerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sherrerd)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2019, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/71 "2019-05-19T21:18:26Z")
> [@Ukulele\_Ike](#): > > Fancy Nancy was published well back into the 1930s. That’s right, but she herself was still with us 47 years ago (and her last novel was published 59 years ago). So if we’re talking about aristos writing successful novels in modern times, as compared with the narrative works being produced in Shakespeare’s time (with reference to the idea that S’s work was actually written by some Earl or other as opposed to having been written by a commoner), she might qualify. ---
**Author:** ![Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aji_de_gallina/32/260_2.png) [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2019, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/72 "2019-05-19T22:57:01Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I dunno; “nobody can be truly human without Shakespeare” sure strikes me as racist. And absurd on many other grounds, too. How does he account for the fact that in other languages, other authors are the Greatest of All Time? Are Spanish-speaking humans a different species, because they’re shaped by Cervantes instead of Shakespeare? The thing about Cervantes is that he basically wrote one super big book and really nothing else of merit. Reading Don Quijote is no easy task. There are no sonnets or shorter plays to read in an extended sitting. We know a lot of quotes from him ut the task of reading DQ is such that very, very few have done it. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2019, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/73 "2019-05-19T23:57:37Z")
OK, I thought _Don Quixote_ was too dense when I attempted it, but I thought that was just the translation. It’s reassuring to hear that a Spanish-speaker thinks the same. ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2019, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/74 "2019-05-20T00:10:47Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > OK, I thought _Don Quixote_ was too dense when I attempted it, but I thought that was just the translation. It’s reassuring to hear that a Spanish-speaker thinks the same. I have the Tobias Smollett translation from the 18th century, and I’ve never been able to penetrate more than a hundred or so pages. Maybe I should try a peppier, more recent version. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2019, 9:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839/75 "2019-05-20T09:34:58Z")
Not sure how I could have forgotten: [Julian Alexander Kitchener-Fellowes, Baron Fellowes of West Stafford DL](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julian_Fellowes) a.k.a. Julian Fellowes, he of Downton Abbey and Gosford Park screenplay fame (and several bestselling novels). Exceedingly posh and inarguably talented in fiction writing. But probably not responsible for writing Shakespeare’s works. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-big-deal-about-shakespeare/833839.md?page=3)