Shakespeare Study: More Miscellaneous Books

My Shakespeare study, which began in earnest in 2010, will likely last the rest of my life. There will always interesting books on the subject, as well as new productions and film adaptations to enjoy. Here are notes on a few of the books I’ve read recently.

William Shakespeare’s The Merry Rise Of Skywalker, Star Wars Part The Ninth by Ian Doescher – I’ve been a fan of Star Wars since 1977, and was excited when Ian Doescher began combining that series with another passion of mine, the work of William Shakespeare. However, when Disney bought Star Wars and destroyed it, my interest in any new Star Wars films evaporated. After the pointless The Force Awakens, I stopped watching. My interest in Shakespeare, on the other hand, has only increased. And I’ve continued to enjoy Ian Doescher’s series of books. While I never saw The Rise Of Skywalker, I did work on it as a production assistant for one day of re-shoots. (Worst craft service ever.) Anyway, the book begins with a Chorus, whose speech is a sonnet. The rest of the book is divided into five acts, as were Shakespeare’s plays, and presented largely in iambic pentameter. As with the other books in the series, there are references and nods to Shakespeare’s works. For example, the first line of the first scene is “Two rivals, both alike in dignity” (p. 10), a nod to the first line of Romeo And Juliet, “Two households, both alike in dignity.” That line is repeated throughout Kylo Ren’s first speech. When someone asks Rey’s family name, she says: “I’m call’d plain Rey./And bonny Rey and sometimes Rey the curst” (p. 38), borrowing from Petruchio’s lines to Kate in The Taming Of The Shrew. C-3PO uses the lines of Othello, saying “It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul” (p. 72). Zorii borrows from Hamlet, telling Poe “Methinks it is a consummation, Poe,/Devoutly to be wish’d” (p. 75). Kylo Ren also quotes Hamlet, saying “The cat will mew, and dog will have his day” (p. 93). Poe borrow from Love’s Labour’s Lost: “Thou art the books, the arts, the academes,/That show, contain, and nourish al the world” (p. 102). After Leia dies, Maz utters a variation of Horatio’s line, “Goodnight, sweet princess” (p. 111). Palpatine chooses as his last words part of a speech from Aaron in Titus Andronicus: “If one good deed in all my life I did,/I do repent it from my very soul” (p. 153). Then Rey and Ben’s final scene together borrows heavily from the end of Romeo And Juliet. The book also contains some illustrations. William Shakespeare’s The Merry Rise Of Skywalker, Star Wars Part The Ninth was published in 2020.

Shakespeare In A Divided America: What Is Plays Tell Us About Our Past And Future by James Shapiro – This country took a nosedive into stupidity and corruption in 2016 when it elected the racist conman Donald Trump. The introduction of James Shapiro’s new book touches upon that production of Julius Caesar held in New York’s Central Park the summer after Donald Trump took office. Shapiro writes, “Like Trump, Caesar seemed easily persuaded by the last person who speaks to him” (p. xxii). And he too is subject to flattery. But this book is not just about the current division in our country. It is a look at different and specific points in the nation’s history, and how Shakespeare relates to those moments. The first chapter, for example, is about miscegenation in the 1830s, and of course relates Othello to that subject. The second chapter, about the idea of manifest destiny, also deals with Othello, and a production put on by the military in which Ulysses S. Grant rehearsed the part of Desdemona, and about female actors portraying Romeo in Romeo And Juliet. The third chapter recounts the deadly riot that occurred in New York over a performance of Macbeth by William Macready. Interestingly, many riots of that time originated at theatres, and Shapiro explains why. The fourth chapter deals with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln by actor John Wilkes Booth, and Lincoln’s passion for certain plays and speeches by Shakespeare. Shapiro writes, “If any American reader of Shakespeare has truly felt – through meditating on the tormented words of guilt-ridden characters like Macbeth and Claudius – the deep connection between the nation’s own primal sin, slavery, and the terrible cost, both collective and personal, exacted by it, it was Lincoln” (p. 113). The fifth chapter deals with immigration in the early 1900s and the relation of The Tempest to the subject, including the belief that in the play Shakespeare was writing about America. The sixth chapter deals with marriage and women’s place in the work force at the end of World War II, here related to The Taming Of The Shrew and Kiss Me, Kate. The seventh chapter uses Shakespeare In Love to discuss thoughts on adultery. The final chapter takes us to that 2017 production of Julius Caesar mentioned in the introduction. Shakespeare In A Divided America: What Is Plays Tell Us About Our Past And Future was published in 2020.

Shakespeare Insult Generator by Barry Kraft – This book is a collection of words used by characters in Shakespeare’s plays to insult one another. It is organized so that there is one word per card, and three cards per “page,” two adjectives and one noun, so that you can flip various cards for many different combinations. On the back of each card is a brief definition of the word. Also two symbols are used, one to indicate words that were first used in print by William Shakespeare (and likely coined by him), and one to indicate words that Shakespeare employed only once in his works. I wish the author also included the name of the play, and perhaps the act, scene and line numbers, where each word can be found, particularly for words that were used only once. But it is a fun book, and a useful one, particularly in these strange days when half the population is made up of lumpish, barren-spirited miscreants. This book was published in 2014.

 

Deadpool: The World’s Greatest Comic Magazine Volume 7: Deadpool Does Shakespeare by Gerry Duggan and Ian Doescher – This book collects three issues of Deadpool. Only the last of the three is related to Shakespeare. It is titled “Much Ado About Deadpool,” and it was written by Ian Doescher, the person responsible for the Shakespeare Star Wars book series. It is presented in five acts. The first page is a drawing of Deadpool as Hamlet, holding Yorick’s skull, but pointing a gun at it with his other hand. Each act has a title, the first being “Something’s Rotten in the State of Deadpool.” Deadpool is confused about his location, and about his inability to cease speaking in iambic pentameter. When William Shakespeare himself starts to explain the situation, Deadpool shoots him with a crossbow. The ghost of Deadpool’s father shows up to urge him to revenge, for which Deadpool is of course ready and willing. The second act is titled “Wherefore Art Thou Deadpool?” And, yes, Deadpool has stumbled into Romeo And Juliet, with a bit of The Taming Of The Shrew thrown in for good measure. And there is a play on the word “wherefore.” Soon Macbeth is mixed into the batch. Act III is titled “King Leery,” and yes, Deadpool finds himself speaking with King Lear, not the king he was seeking to kill. Lear manages to behead Deadpool before being chased off by a bear (yes, a reference to Shakespeare’s most famous stage direction from The Winter’s Tale). Act IV is titled “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Deadpool,” and it begins with an appearance by Prospero, followed by an appearance by the Porter from Macbeth. The fifth act is titled “All’s Well That Dies Well.” And, as you might imagine, there is a whole lot of death. Deadpool: The World’s Greatest Comic Magazine Volume 7: Deadpool Does Shakespeare was published in 2017.

Shakespeare: The Truth by Patrick Barlow – This is a humorous book that takes the facts of Shakespeare’s life as we know them and plays with them. For example, Patrick Barlow exaggerates the significance of his father’s work with gloves: “In fact, many whole plays were inspired by his father’s obsession with constantly inventing new kinds of gloves. In particular, the woollen glove which inspired The Winter’s Tale (see Chapter III, ‘Early Days In Sheep Street’), the measuring glove which inspired Measure For Measure, the animal-handling glove which inspired The Taming Of The Shrew and, of course, the rubber glove which inspired Pericles – Prince Of Tyre” (pages 6-7). He also plays with the fact that Anne Hathaway was older than Shakespeare, having Shakespeare’s mother ask, “But is she not about forty-eight?” (p. 20). There are also plays on the idea of the foul papers and on the fact that few stage directions are included in Shakespeare’s plays. And of course much is made of the so-called lost years, which the author claims Shakespeare spent in Tibet. Sprinkled throughout the book are playful fake quotes from Shakespeare. In particular, I like the one that starts the chapter about the Globe: “Oh that this too, too wooden Globe would melt!” (p. 91). It plays both on Hamlet and on the fact that the Globe burned down. Patrick Barlow also attempts to improve some Shakespeare’s works, offering, for example, a new version of Julius Caesar in which Julius Caesar does not die. The book includes illustrations. The drawing depicting the end of the Spanish Armada made me laugh. Shakespeare: The Truth was published in 1993.

The Age Of Shakespeare by Frank Kermode – This book contains information on Shakespeare’s work and the English world during his time, including the changing religious views. Regarding the so-called “mystery plays,” Kermode writes: “Solemnity was mixed with broad humor, and some stock characters became famous – when Hamlet tells the traveling actors not to out-Herod Herod, he is alluding to the traditional rant of that character in the Corpus Christi plays” (p. 17). Kermode also stresses the importance of the line of succession, and gets a bit into Essex and that infamous performance of Richard The Second. The book also gets into the process of acting itself and the likely changes in style from the time of Shakespeare’s earliest works to the time of Hamlet and Macbeth. The plays themselves are also discussed. Regarding The Taming Of The Shrew, Kermode reminds us that “It needs to be read or watched without reference to modern feminism, and one should also remember that the taming of Katherina takes place in a play within a play, which puts the story at another remove from reality” (pages 78-79). He talks about how the entire thing is like the training of a hawk. “Katherina behaves like an untrained hawk, ‘bating’ (a mad rush of angry activity, endangering the precious integrity of the feathers) and generally resisting the trainer, until at last tamed into the condition of a model wife, returning to the glove of the trainer without the aid of the creance. One needs to see the wife-taming in the light of this elaborate joke, which would have been appreciated by the groundlings as easily as a modern audience would accept a comic football metaphor” (p. 79). Regarding The Merchant Of Venice, Kermode writes: “Sometimes it is hard to see in which direction our sympathies are being solicited: for example, are we expected to approve of the conduct of Jessica, a thief and a runaway?” (p. 97). And regarding Measure For Measure, Kermode writes: “It is set in Vienna, but Vienna is a surrogate for London, and the inns and brothels of the low-life scenes belong to Southwark, right next to the theater” (pages 142-143). The Age Of Shakespeare was published in 2003. I read the Modern Library Edition of 2004.

In Possession Of Shakespeare: Writing Into Nothing edited by Theresia de Vroom – This is an interesting and unusual book. As editor Theresia de Vroom indicates in the introduction, it “contains essays, poems, autobiographical reflections, and a musical composition” (p. 2), by writers who have been influenced in one way or another by Shakespeare. But the pieces aren’t all necessarily about Shakespeare. She also explains the book’s subtitle: “It is an evocation of Cordelia’s ‘nothing,’ which defines the essential inability of the bond between a child and her father to be named. The resulting silence is a void that is immediately filled by apocalyptic tragedy. All the contributors to this book are writing into nothing, into the inexpressible, and the sometimes tragic” (p. 6). Before each piece is a quoted passage from a Shakespeare play, most lines coming from King Lear. And at the end is a musical adaptation of King Lear that focuses on the relationship between Lear and Cordelia. The book includes a compact disc of that adaptation, with Wole Soyinka providing the voice of Lear. There are also illustrations throughout the book. In Possession Of Shakespeare: Writing Into Nothing was published in 2012.