Othello is actually my favorite tragedy of his besides Hamlet. Of course Hamlet is in another class all together and to talk about it would be trite, but I think aesthetically, philosophically, character-wise, it DOES deserve its great reputation ... but why talk about it, it's so overdiscussed.
That's why I choose Othello, and about Othello, I still find it weird that I actually deeply sympathize with Iago; he's just so much more human and self-aware than everyone else around him, even if a bit bitter and insane, and I can't help but think that Shakespeare was putting a lot of himself into Iago
I don't wanna pull a Stephen Dedalus but there's SO much shit in Shakespeare about being cuckolded, the pains of it, that he writes so passionately (to the point of self-parody in Cymbeline) that it makes you wonder... I think Joyce was really onto something in the Library scene of Ulysses.
I'm surprised you didn't like MND, it doesn't have any great or interesting characters in it IMO (as in super deep or anything, although Bottom is a classic one), yes, it's not as philosophically/emotionally deep as his other works, but I think it's one of his most beautifully written. The point of it, I found, was in the poetry of it, also it's hard not to be cerebrally impressed at how deftly he ties in the three subplots, it's not emotionally moving, but intellectually, with your brain, you realize it's pretty well done. also it actually is pretty funny, the best IMO is when Lysander, Hermia, Helena and Demetrius fight in the woods
>Best tragedy is Othello, best comedy would have to be As You Like It.
mein mensch
it's something of a joke in criticism/amongst English teachers that Lady Macbeth and Macky have the best marriage in all of Shakespeare's works. It's a weird way to put it, but yeah, the Lady does turn out to be pretty weak and sentimental in the end, and her apparent bitchiness in the beginning is still "good" in a way because it shows they're working together in the relationship and she wants to spur him onto ambition
Honorable mentions: Troilus and Cressida is one of his more cerebral, bitter works, with Shakespeare not even boisterous enough to parody himself and his plays ridiculously as he does in Cymbeline, it's hard to get attached to any of the characters, but holy son of a bitch it has some of the best poetry he ever wrote in it IMO, his most consistently complexly and beautifully written
Cymbeline is hilarious for how Shakespeare seemed to be really bored and resentful of everyone and everything around him, including himself, when he wrote it, and thus took it out by writing the most ridiculous shit
>Come on; tune: if you can penetrate her with your fingering, so; we'll try with tongue too: if none
will do, let her remain; but I'll never give o'er.
The fact that it's not supposed to be a comedy makes the parts like these that much better and funnier. long post over
