Reading the "no fear shakespeare" things on sparknotes (shakespeare in everyday modern english

>we like to drink and party
>other nations look down on us for this
>we can't help it, it's in our nature

This. Intro to the First folio says if you don't like him then you probably don't understand him and need to read him again. The intro was written right after Shakespeare died

Not extensively, and having the plot and themes spoonfed to you doesn't make you much better at reading the verse in plays the class doesn't cover.

I think people underestimate it. You're talking about hundreds of years of separation. A different culture with different puns and slang, unfamiliar pronouns and conjugations, different syntax, different word order at times. All of this made for a medium that also relies on visual cues at times, because it's a play. As an adult, only now can I understand it with the addition of learning what's behind the curtain in terms grammar and reading older works with older constructions. I don't understand how you're supposed to sit down and read it blind without supplementary reading and knowledge. Yes, it's modern English, but I think it would be less harmful and more helpful to acknowledge and treat his work as a different dialect that needs some study.

Those two things are not mutually exclusive, and in Shakespeare's case, they get furled beautifully.

>anyone else?
Yes, I am pleb and just can't take Shakespeare in the original but his story telling is solid. I loved Merchant of Venice when I could understand everything that was going on line by line.

It´s a book/poem for me,it´s fucking hard to read,it´s a language hard.
One question,it´s a 10/10 William shakespeare it´s so overrated,like Da vinci,Michelangelo,Issac Newton,Dante,Goethe.

Hamlet it´s 10/10,William Shakespeare created a genre,definitions for books,movies,videogames and animes,seriously.
>Overrated
this guy deserve this praise because he fucking created literature.

...

If you can't read Shakespeare with only minor inconvenience, you either need a better edition or you should leave this board

Any tips for understanding Shakespeare? Should I just go with the Folger editions with the notes, or is that viewed in the same light as reading the No Fear versions?

Get the Norton anthologies

Here's my tip: Don't read it as a poem, but just read them as normal sentences. Ignore the line breaks and just pay attention to the periods and sentence structures. Make it a bit easier to understand.

Watch more Shakespeare. The Globe theater has a punch of amazing stage productions on DVD

>tfw reading this in class

SAMPSON
'Tis all one, I will show myself a tyrant: when I
have fought with the men, I will be cruel with the
maids, and cut off their heads.

GREGORY
The heads of the maids?

SAMPSON
Ay, the heads of the maids, or their maidenheads;
take it in what sense thou wilt.

GREGORY
They must take it in sense that feel it.

SAMPSON
Me they shall feel while I am able to stand: and
'tis known I am a pretty piece of flesh.

GREGORY
'Tis well thou art not fish; if thou hadst, thou
hadst been poor John. Draw thy tool! here comes
two of the house of the Montagues.

SAMPSON
My naked weapon is out: quarrel, I will back thee.

Shakespearean language is a bizarre super-tongue, alien and plastic, twisting, turning, and forever escaping. It is untranslatable, since it knocks Anglo-Saxon root words against Norman and Greco-Roman importations sweetly or harshly, kicking us up and down rhetorical levels with witty abruptness. No one in real life ever spoke like Shakespeare's characters. His language does not "make sense," especially in the greatest plays. Anywhere from a third to a half of every Shakespearean play, I conservatively estimate, will always remain under an interpretive cloud. Unfortunately, this fact is obscured by the encrustations of footnotes in modern texts, which imply to the poor cowed student that if only he knew what the savants do, all would be as clear as day. Every time I open Hamlet, I am stunned by its hostile virtuosity, its elusiveness and impenetrability. Shakespeare uses language to darken. He suspends the traditional compass points of rhetoric, still quite firm in Marlowe, normally regarded as Shakespeare's main influence. Shakespeare's words have "aura." This he got from Spenser, not Marlowe.

lel how big of a brainlet do you need to be to not be able to intuit the meaning of major shakespearean monolgues

actual quality post
much appreciated

Isn't he a borderline poet though? A lot depends on the sound and rhythm of his work.

Nicely put. I like the "aura" point. There's an extent to which you just have to grab onto Shakespeare and hold on tight. You may not understand the ride he takes you on, but you'll sure as hell experience it.

Not borderline, he was a literal poet. More than half of his work is written in verse

tips on reading Spenser?

>Ignore the line breaks
>Ignore the line breaks
>Ignore the poetry of the greatest poet of all time
You literally can't make this shit up

We can settle this easily

put up or shut up

vocaroo

passages

user rate

>, different syntax, different word order at times

That's mostly Shakespeare, read anything else at the time that's not in verse and it should be basically comprehensible as English.

Shakespeare actually just has very difficult writing. A lot of it references things we are no longer commonly familiar with, so it takes a proper historian of his time to follow that bit.
He is taught because he is difficult, mostly because of that aspect. We all know that they are not so concerned with quality these days, in high schools, not that he is not 'quality'.
One can read 'technical' writing at the same time and it is not so difficult. I would argue that Chaucer isn't even as difficult, despite being more distant.
The general meaning is exactly that: general. To go beyond is the difficult part.

>I would argue that Chaucer isn't even as difficult, despite being more distant.

And I would completely agree with this.

So, on first hearing the bit below, you just intuit all of it's meaning?

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.—Soft you now!
The fair Ophelia! Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember'd.

But what is the point?

Not that user but you posted one of the easiest monologues in Shakespeare

>When he himself might his quietus make
>With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,

These are literally the only tricky lines in that speech, because of quietus, bodkin and fardels, which are no longer commonly used.
If you can't understand the rest you are a pleb, all the words are still used today

idiot...........

This is Camille paglia. I can tell.

>'tis known I am a pretty piece of flesh.
lel

It's not much different than Shakespeare

You're meant to reread something like Shakespeare. Of course it's not going to be easy on a first run through if you aren't used to early modern english

brilliant. so you'll tell me exactly what he means then? there should be no question since this is the easiest and we'll all agree the most well known of his soliloquies?

>should I end my troubles by killing myself?
>nah, I'm too afraid of what might come after death.

I could, but you seem like such a moron I'm not sure how dumbed down I need to make this.
Let's start at the beginning. Do you know what 'be' means?

Can we just admit that for most people Shakespeare, Goethe, Schiller etc. Are better to read in class with the guidance of a teacher.

There is nothing wrong with beeing normal and needing help.

Don't let people make you insecure.
Take small bits at a time. Look for addition information on the internet or conversation with peers or parents.

And don't listen to people to much.

Listening to Kafka fans is like listening to the sex story's of high school kids.

They are mostly made up.

It's probably the use of "conscience" that throws me most.

I guess maybe it's just that simple. The bard was prone to a obvious lack of succinctness I guess. Maybe all of the redundancy gave it more of a dramatic impact. If he cut it down to the two lines you have it would certainly be a bit clearer.

Wow can snobs please fuck off?
This is literally "Damn life is suffering and death doesn't have suffering. But life has good things too. But what if death isn't peaceful either?"
Just because it's a few hundred years old an idea every teenager comes up with is the highest of literature.

>caring about what's said rather than how it's said
I bet you care more about plot that prose too

Some people think that
>Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?
Refers to avenging his father's death rather than suicide

Oh, and then that's why he says, "in the mind"?

I get thrown by "in the mind" and "conscience" as somehow modifying the meaning from the literal interpretation. Maybe he's referring to his conscious acknowledgement of his duty in this regard. Thus he's wondering whether or not he's choosing to stay alive for the right reasons.

The term "conscience" in that soliloquy is just an archaic variant of "consciousness."

What William Shakespeare done for world?
i don´t read nothing but,for me he doesn´t do anything for the world.
>genius
>life,life muh da we qaodlfp
>my life it´s hard,should i kill myself?
playing with words it´s disgusting.
What the fuck he is considered a genius?
Genius in my opinion are:Issac Newton,Descartes,Da vinci,Michelangelo,and others.

...

He did affect the English language more than probably any other single individual

If you were to ask me to name three geniuses, I probably wouldn't say Einstein, Newton... I'd go Milligan, Cleese, Everett... Sessions.

William Shakespeare it´s a genius,because he in 1500,1545,created various masterpieces:Hamlet,Otelo,Macbeth,Lear,and others things.
And imagine in 1500 you create a "book"who have hard language to understand,and ironically,a masterpiece nowadays,seriously a "book"from 1500 it´s better than nowadays "book"and a masterpiece.
He is a genius who changed the literature for decades.

Shakespeare:
>To be, or not to be? That is the question—

Fear No Shakespeare:
>The question is: is it better to be alive or dead?

lmao

It's not that complicated. He's saying that thinking about what might exist after death makes one a coward and weakens one's will to consider suicide. Keep in mind that suicide was considered a grave sin in Shakespeare's time.

Shakespeare isn't actually good.
All it takes to be considered a masterpiece is a bunch of snobs who collectively decided it should be.
Hmm I wonder why it takes centuries for masterpieces and artists to be recognized as genius. If they were really that good wouldn't they immediately be recognized as having a certain quality that will stand the test of time? Hmm...

Literally just watch clips of any performance that includes people reading lines as originally written if you can't imagine how they might reasonably sound.

>I guess maybe it's just that simple. The bard was prone to a obvious lack of succinctness I guess. Maybe all of the redundancy gave it more of a dramatic impact.
Yeah, that's it. When I think or speak in real life, I only ever think the summary of what I would have thought if I was a long-winded pleb.

You should probably set yourself on fire.

>Hmm I wonder why it takes centuries for masterpieces and artists to be recognized as genius.
Read the elegies written to Shakespeare in the First Folio. He was considered a genius by his peers literally right after he died.

>no argument
Ok
This is a better argument but still flawed

No argument is required to defeat a non-point. You argue that Shakespeare isn't actually good. Your defence for that stance is 'If they were really that good wouldn't they immediately be recognized as having a certain quality that will stand the test of time? Hmm...' which is a sentiment so thoroughly inane that it's barely worth addressing. So I repeat my prompt for you to go and set yourself on fire.

Your argument is that that if it takes centuries for genius to be affirmed, then the fact that the qualities that make the work genius aren't immediately apparent to everyone means that the genius is something invented by people post hoc as a sort-of myth.

Your argument is predicated on the notion that Shakespeare wasn't considered a genius in his own time, which isn't true. The fact that they printed his work in folio form (something reserved for important liturgical and philosophical works) says it all. Theater was considered trash back in his day, and they still decided to spend a shit-ton of money to preserve his plays in a folio run. And Milton, who was born before Shakespeare died and was the biggest poet in Britain while alive, talked about the genius of Shakespeare all the time. So you're basically talking out of your ass.

How it it inane. If something is a masterpiece it is always a masterpiece and should always have been recognized as a masterpiece. Why is there so many "geniuses" only recognized posthumously? Why is their "genius" only apparent after they are dead?

Because people are stupid herd animals and it takes a bit of time for the self-congratulatory crowd to realise that there's something outside of their group-fellatio sessions, even if it is something incredible and beneficial to all of them.

>Why does work need time to disseminate and be analysed
Is this seriously a point of confusion for you? Firstly, as other anons have said, Shakespeare WAS recognised as a genius in his time. Secondly, even someone isn't acknowledged whilst alive and is only recognised much later, that doesn't suggest that they weren't a genius. Perhaps the attitudes of the time biased people against them; perhaps their work only had time to gain momentum after their death as with Lovecraft or Van Gogh; perhaps their greatest work was published posthumously a la Virgil or Dickinson. All geniuses, with the possible exception of Lovecraft, but not recognised in their entirety until after their deaths for one reason or another.

Genius is usually immediately recognized by those most familiar with the medium, but most people aren't invested enough in any medium to know more than its most popular figures. It's not so much that they're recognized after their death, it's that their recognition filters down to the plebs after their death.

Okay.
Can you point out any genius that is alive right now, for any subject?

Steve Reich, Günter Grass, Jürgen Habermas, Terrence Malick

Of course. Hawking would be an obvious one. Scorsese, perhaps - though I won't pretend to be too knowledgeable about film. If you want a literal example, Kasparov. Pynchon is still alive if you demand a writer.
And I'm not even an expert in any of those fields. An academic could probably name many more.

>If they were really that good wouldn't they immediately be recognized as having a certain quality that will stand the test of time?
No? It took many years for Van Gogh to be recognized as a good artist. Same for a lot of other artists. I don't see why we should consider the critical judgement of the artist's contemporaries inherently more valuable.

>Günter Grass

user.. I'm sorry to break this to you

Can we find any traces of "objective correlative" or "negative capability" in his sonnets?

i have a question about reading shakespeare. am i suppposed to have a slight pause at the line breaks, like a normal poem? for instance

>No more; and by a sleep to say we end
>The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
>That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
>Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;

Is each line taken on its own, i.e. a poem, or should you try to read it like normal dialogue with no lline breaks?

Thanks, that makes sense. I guess I see "in the mind", "conscience" and "pale cast of thought" and I want the thing to be more than just a simple "I'd kill myself if I wasn't such a pussy". And I guess "all my sins remember'd" is his way of saying, "don't forget you're such a pussy dude." Why does he add that bit?

Also, is there anyplace to look online for a list of words that mean different things when Shakespeare uses them? I see a word like "conscience" and thinks he actually means"conscience" rather than "consciousness". Maybe that's why I have a hard time reading him, I just don't know the archaic lexicon that well.

I thought you weren't supposed to pause through an enjambment. Have I been reading poetry wrong?

>Lovecraft
>not genius
okay,i believe,but seriously?
he created a definition of horror genre,and man it´s a universe well developed,and more?better than Stephen King,Lovecraft it´s the father of horror genre.

All you gotta know is that "nothing" meant vagina

Are you Camille Paglia?

People tend to come at Shakespeare from the wrong direction. The plays themselves aren't confusing when you're watching an actual performance. When you're reading it as literature it's easy to get hung up on every word and feel like you're staring at a senseless wall of text, especially if you're used to reading on that level There are definitely a lot of things in it that are open to interpretation critically and philosophically but the actual plot and general sentiments of the monologues will not be lost on you in a competent performance.

Homer is popular in audiobook form for the same reason.

*not used to reading on that level

I think it is most useful to watch one of his plays performed and then go back and read the script. Youll have a better image of what is going on and will be able to respect and analyse the prose for yourself.

Your relationship to a Shakespeare text is something that should last years. I still re-read Coriolanus and Hamlet about once a year, and watch performances all the time. I usually find something new every time.

Thats the best argument for not reading the spark notes editions as well. You'll never be able to get more out of it if just read one interpretation. It would be like reading a no fear Nietchze. I hope that isnt a thing.

I also wonder about it.

But I'm sure you couldn't get anything new from rereading the "easiest monologue in all of shakespeare" right? Because you're really just supposed to ignore all of those extra words and focus on the gist of the meaning at a surface level. To do otherwise is to be (or not to be?) a moron.

The way meaning is drawn out of contemporary texts (think critical theory) is vastly different from the tools you need to draw out meaning from something written in the late 16th century. Understanding Shakespeare is about understanding the Bible, Chaucer, Virgil, Ovid, early modern English, etc. Just studying the accent Shakespeare spoke in can alter how you perceive his texts significantly. Here's what a passage from Midsummer Night's Dream would have sounded like in Shakespeare's time:

youtube.com/watch?v=MrzcyDZADss

Studying that aspect of his work alone can take a ton of work and is immensely rewarding (like 1/3 of the rhymes Shakespeare used no longer rhyme in a modern accent).

So no, it's not as simple as ignoring superfluous words and focusing on the meaning of the text itself.

;)

If not, why are the line breaks even there in poetry? Honest question because I dont know. I assumed line breaks in poetry were there for a reason, but apparently we're supposed to read them like sentences?

Someone who's actually studied poetry more than I have can correct me, but I think there's supposed to be some subjectivity whether or not you pause only after end-stopped lines, or if you pause during the middle of an enjambment too. I never pause during run-on lines.

>I assumed line breaks in poetry were there for a reason
A main function is making it easier to understand the work's meter. You're supposed to read each foot of the iambic rhythm as unstressed then stressed.

>The plays themselves aren't confusing when you're watching an actual performance.

Yeah they are though, I totally wouldn't have made head or tail of them without a plot summery in high school. It's like listening to complete gibberish by a madman.

Is English your mother tongue? I can see how sometimes a word, or phrase, or metaphor might be said too quickly to grasp properly but not being able to understand the basic elements of the plot?

-if you have money and patience, get the arden individual editions and/or the norton complete works. we all know that the arden editions have a shit ton of notes, but while reading you can discern which ones are essential and which are mere context. the folger ones are cheap and their notes are kinda dry, but hey they have the original text which is delightful and shockingly understable. you just gotta put a little bit of effort
-remember that these are plays intended to be staged, that these are lines of verse intended to be recited out loud in dialogues between actors, so watch the plays. the globe on screen productions are superb.
-keep on reading. at first it's kinda hard, but after a bit you get accustomed and then you'll have no problems.