The poet's pen turns them to shapes

The Doctor and the Bard

Part of my day job is to evaluate school childrens' handwriting--to see if it's either too slow, illegible, or otherwise nonexistant, so as to warrant assistive technology. Usually, a specialized pencil grip or keyboarding practice is suggested. Ironic, then, that I have some of the worst handwriting  of any adult you will encounter. Sure, if I think about it and focus on making it legible, it looks fine, but why would I do that when 99% of my written communication is through a keyboard?

Even more ironic, then, that my father always writes in a precise, but not fastidious Copperplate at all times. He even has the artistic training and inclination to sweep out fanciful cursive scripts when the occasion calls for it. He loves computer gadgetry, but collects pens and writes all his notes by hand. And of course, he's a terrible hunt-and-peck typist.

So when the subject of cursive handwriting not being taught in schools anymore came up, we gently butted heads about the usefulness of handwriting in our modern era. Cursive was good enough for Shakespeare, right? Why isn't it good enough for me?

I learned cursive in school. My handwriting is much more legible in cursive than manuscript, but damn, does it cramp my hands after a paragraph. No wonder all these kids I see at work have issues. It takes more fine motor skills and muscles to create ink-on-paper words. Of course, if we had more practice, we'd be able to do it faster and with less pain. Practice is always the thing!

In school, I remember I'd be able to memorize things better if I wrote them down myself. Up until high school, when my computer fiend father inevitably got me a Palm Pilot and a portable keyboard, I wrote things out in longhand, and indeed, it helped my studying. But in college, when everything was done on my laptop in my dorm, typing was the only way to go. I still did fine in my studies, BTW.

But this past Christmas, when my dad gifted me a fanciful lined notebook of the type he was more apt to use on a regular basis, I wasn't sure what to do with it. I felt I should fill it with something worth the time and effort of carefully writing it in a legible hand. At that point, I was halfway through my Trippingly Project. What was more worthy of such a fine notebook than all the words I was burning into my brain every week?

Even now, I've only written eleven of the 40 speeches I've memorized into this notebook. It's hard, and takes concentration, because I can't fix it once it's set down. What pressure Shakespeare must have had to get it right the first time, what with how expensive paper and ink was in his time! I'm sure he made mistakes and added shit in the margins or deleted things with a scrawl. It's more visceral to see writing on paper; it's so much more permanent a record of a writer's thoughts and mental journeys. But damn, does it hurt. 

Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie

Helena, why do you love this jerk?

It's a tale worthy of Jerry Springer: a virtuous girl falls for a rich dude, he doesn't take notice until she cures the King, who insists the young man marries this wonderful physician, but the boy coldly yields and runs off to fight in the war, the girl goes after him, tricks him into sleeping with her, and the springe he set for himself--he said unless she wore his ring and got pregnant, he wouldn't call her his wife--ensnares him in the end. 

The wanker in question is Bertram, Count of Roussillion. The very determined lady is Helena, the orphaned daughter of a great doctor who is under the care of the dowager Countess of Roussillion. It's not just that Bertram is young, dumb, and horny (he thinks he's bedding a whore when it's actually Helena disguised in the dark bedroom), but that this poor girl actually cherishes the shit out of him, which rankles my modern-day sensibilities to no end. Sure, Helena proves herself very witty, educated, and clever in her quest to get this jag-off to call her his wife, but it smacks of just the kind of rom-com I would avoid if it were made into a film. Sans the benefit of the passionate banter and underlying adoration of Benedick and Beatrice, the concluding promise Bertram makes to love her completely lacks a truly enjoyable resolution. The titular sentiment of the play declares itself with a bemused shrug of the shoulders rather than a snarky "I told you so" grin. 

Despite all this, I cheer Helena's resilience in the face of terrible odds. Her speech poeticizes the species of inexplicable infatuation that is the mark of proper fangirling, as well as outlines a general self-proclaimed call-to-arms when it comes to getting shit done on your own... even though that project deceived you, you did it your way, Helena. Girl power!

All's Well That Ends Well, Act I, Sc. I

Helena: Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie

Which we ascribe to heaven: the fated sky

Gives us free scope; only doth backward pull 

Our slow designs when we ourselves are dull. 

What power is it which mounts my love so high; 

That makes me see, and cannot feed mine eye? 

The mightiest space in fortune nature brings 

To join like likes, and kiss like native things. 

Impossible be strange attempts to those 

That weigh their pains in sense, and do suppose 

What hath been cannot be: who ever strove 

To show her merit, that did miss her love?

The king's disease, --my project may deceive me, 

But my intents are fix'd and will not leave me.

They can be meek that have no other cause

Dame Judi Dench being absolutely lovely as the rightly confused Adriana.

The Comedy of Errors does exactly what it says on the tin: it's a play rife with slapstick confusion based almost entirely on mistaken identity.

Now, imagine you are Adriana, and your husband, Antipholus of Ephesus, has a super secret estranged identical twin brother from Syracuse, whose manservant Dromio happens to be the super secret estranged identical twin brother of your husband's manservant, and they all have the same first names.  Antipholus of Syracuse has been searching for his brother for five years, and finally stumbled upon an inn in Ephesus, where Dromio of Ephesus shows up and tells him he's late for dinner. Antipholus of Syracuse thinks his manservant has gone mad and roundly smacks him up and down.

Meanwhile, you're at home with your unmarried sister Luciana, who is calmly trying to convince you that you ought to forbear complaint regarding the behavior of your lost husband, because that's what a good wife does. Dromio comes back, says your husband beat him up for telling him to come home. You begin to fret, worried that your beauty is fading and your husband is whoring around.

Luciana pisses you off with her willful attitude of servitude, and you give her a proto-feminist lesson on marital politics, and, essentially, a lesson on walking in someone else's shoes:

The Comedy of Errors, Act II, Sc. I

Adriana: Patience unmoved! No marvel though she pause;
They can be meek that have no other cause.
A wretched soul, bruised with adversity
We bid be quiet when we hear it cry,
But were we burdened with like weight of pain,
As much or more we should ourselves complain.
So thou, that hast no unkind mate to grieve thee,
With urging helpless patience would relieve me;
But, if thou live to see like right bereft,
This fool-begged patience in thee will be left.

If music be the food of love, play on

Duke Orsino is in love with being in love. He's so hopelessly in love with it that he opines as he opens the play with his famous speech. It waxes with as apt a metaphor as any for that most coveted of emotional states, comparing love to plant life that must be fed--almost Audrey II-like--with so much nourishing music that it would rather die of being gorged than go without.

At the start of Twelfth Night, the Duke adores countess Olivia so much that he likens himself to a hart in the wood, passively and happily pursued by the "cruel hounds" of his desires. He lies back, awaiting Valentine, the messenger, to give him word of his beloved's condition. Unfortunately, she is so overwhelmed with grief over her brother's death that she swears to cloister herself in her chamber for seven years. Orsino, understanding and even exalting the depth of her passion expressed thusly, imagines how orgasmic things will be when she comes out of her funk and decides to focus all her affections on Orsino himself. 

For the Duke, the melancholy associated with spurned love is as exciting as love itself and he wallows in it for his own appetite's sake. He can't even get off his ass to woo this sad Olivia; he sends messengers--and even the cross-dressed Viola (calling herself Cesario)--to woo Olivia in his stead. He's so obsessed with being rejected and being in sickly sweet despair that he doesn't even notice that his boy Cesario is actually a woman who has fallen in love with him. Needless to say, all is well in the end, just as soon as the breeches and yellow cross-garters are set aside and everyone reveals their true selves.

Orsino would LOVE fandom culture if he were around today. Set him in front of a Netflix-connected TV and put on Downton Abbey or Sherlock or Doctor Who and he'll likely swoon with all the unrequited romances before him. Give him an iPad with fanfiction on it, and he'll definitely implode... or start a tumblr blog. Because being in a serious fandom is much like standing in a packed theatre watching a stirring play--they both give us an intimately shared emotional joyride. Smiles or tears, the feels alone are high fantastical.

Twelfth Night, Act I, Sc. I

Duke Orsino: If music be the food of love, play on;

Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken, and so die.
That strain again! it had a dying fall:
O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet sound,
That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing and giving odour! Enough; no more:
'Tis not so sweet now as it was before.
O spirit of love! how quick and fresh art thou,
That, notwithstanding thy capacity
Receiveth as the sea, nought enters there,
Of what validity and pitch soe'er,
But falls into abatement and low price,
Even in a minute: so full of shapes is fancy
That it alone is high fantastical.

My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth!

I have long desired to feel Hamlet's fourth soliloquy inside me--and thanks to Sir Ken's admittedly zealous but equally exhilarating delivery of said speech, all kinds of feelings are inside me--so I said to myself, "This thing's to do!" and just fucking did it. Just now.

After approximately 60 minutes of stomping around my room in hobbit feet and doing the occasional push-up, I unlocked another achievement. My skillz have improved since I first embarked on this endeavor; it took me as long to learn ten lines of Richard III's 42-line speech. Turns out, cold repetition was going about it all wrong. 

Enter, Patsy Rodenburg, voice coach extraordinaire. As a non-actress, reading her book has been a challenge for me, but the multitudinous exercises she suggests for tackling any speech in Shakespeare have informed me greatly, and inspired me to do the seemingly asinine activities I described above. Joining physicality to the words by breathing, turning, and pushing them out with the voice help with initial practice. Decoding the language, beating out the iambic, and reading the full thoughts without terminating at line breaks has definitely increased understanding and decreased average memorization time. There are many more skills she imparts in her book, Speaking Shakespare, that I have found worthy of devoting time toward in order to enrich my project. And if tonight's marathon of speaking is any indication, it's been $15 well spent.

Exit Patsy, Enter Hamlet. 

In the wilderness with R&G escorting him toward England (after having mistakenly murdering Polonius), Hamlet hears news of Prince Fortinbras' military plans. Hamlet has an epiphany of sorts, and his beautifully-formed nine sentences of pure thought reveal just how much a man of action he shall become in the last scenes of the play. 

Compared to his last three soliloquies, this one is noticeably more solid and slightly more brief, with less room for questions and more for definitive answers. It's sharp, sparkling, hard, and clear like polished crystal, a prism through which Hamlet's thoughts split into crisply defined intentions and shine upon the promise of his actions. He sees and comments upon the very tangible Norwegian army before him, compares the delicate prince's motives to his own, then, presuming he has far more reason than Fortinbras to have excitements in his blood, lights his own fire under his ass to pursue his revenge. 

It's a heroic declaration, but still true to Hamlet's deep philosophical soul, and it quivers my ovaries just to mouth the words.

Hamlet, Act IV, Sc. IV

Hamlet: How all occasions do inform against me,
And spur my dull revenge! What is a man,
If his chief good and market of his time
Be but to sleep and feed? a beast, no more.
Sure, he that made us with such large discourse,
Looking before and after, gave us not
That capability and god-like reason
To fust in us unused. Now, whether it be
Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple
Of thinking too precisely on the event--
A thought which, quarter’d, hath but one part wisdom
And ever three parts coward--I do not know
Why yet I live to say ‘This thing’s to do,
’Sith I have cause and will and strength and means
To do’t. Examples gross as earth exhort me:
Witness this army of such mass and charge
Led by a delicate and tender prince,
Whose spirit with divine ambition puff’d
Makes mouths at the invisible event,
Exposing what is mortal and unsure
To all that fortune, death and danger dare,
Even for an egg-shell. Rightly to be great
Is not to stir without great argument,
But greatly to find quarrel in a straw
When honour’s at the stake. How stand I then,
That have a father kill’d, a mother stain’d,
Excitements of my reason and my blood,
And let all sleep, while, to my shame, I see
The imminent death of twenty thousand men,
That, for a fantasy and trick of fame,
Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot
Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause,
Which is not tomb enough and continent
To hide the slain? O, from this time forth,
My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth!

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow

Coming in a close second place for "Most Emo Shakespeare Speech EVAR" is.... Macbeth and his melancholy-saturated bucket of resentment toward that horrible journey he calls life! Hamlet's Act I soliloquy about his incestuous uncle and mom takes first, of course. And Othello a close third, I'd think. You may argue about King Lear's weepfests, but once you're past a certain age, your rants against the world turn more downright sad than college-student-just-wants-material-for-his-late-night-guitar-busking-to-impress-dorm-girls emo.

Not that either Macbeth or Hamlet have no good reason to be sad sacks--they have more reason than any 19-year-old sk8terboi on campus could ever dream of having. Mr. Thane of Glamis, Cawdor, and newly crowned King of Scotland has just been informed that his ball-breaking Lady Macbeth finally died of her cray cray, and he just needs to poeticize his feels. I mean, he did everything she asked in order to satisfy HER voracious desire for power and then SHE has the gall to let that damned spot knock her off the merry-go-round. If you're fortunate enough to experience the McKittrick Hotel's Sleep No More in NYC, you know all this at least led to some great make-up acrobatics in the bedroom before the daggers came out. Not sure it was worth it in the end for Macbeth, however. What, with the beheading and all.

Macbeth, Act V, Sc. V
Macbeth: She should have died hereafter;
There would have been a time for such a word.
Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury
Signifying nothing. 

I know you all...

I would be remiss not to acknowledge how much the BBC's Hollow Crown series influenced this particular choice of speech. On the brink of full-throttle fangirling over Tom Hiddleston's Loki in Thor/Avengers and his Magnus in Wallander, I fell once again into the King Henry V trap known as the "Wooing of Kate" scene. It pushed me over the edge in regards to Sir Ken, and it did the same with Hiddles. My heart had no chance. 

The Hollow Crown is a thoroughly engaging series anyway, and I highly recommend it to all who enjoy really solid acting and movie-making. The series covers the Henriad, aka Richard II, Henry IV (Parts One and Two), and Henry V. It was a treat to see the character arc of one of my favorites--Prince Hal--brought to life by a damn pretty man, who just happens to be talented as well, which is always a plus. 

The Prince of Wales appears to be a wayward son. As much is hinted at within the text of Richard II, wherein the newly-crowned Henry IV mentions that his "unthrifty son" frequents taverns and hangs out with "unrestrained loose companions," engaging in wanton, youthful activity most unprince-like. The King's chagrin continues into the next two plays as the jolly Prince Hal carouses with the likes of John Falstaff and his knobbly-nosed bosom buddies in Eastcheap amongst winos and prostitutes.

But Hal has a plan, which he deftly outlines in the first act of 1 Henry IV. His soliloquy reveals to the audience that all his delinquent behavior is an act meant to make his planned rise to the throne and subsequent sudden competency appear miraculous, therefore completely blowing his enemies' minds. Meanwhile, it's hinted later on that Hal is steeping himself in the base environs of his subjects to better understand the nuances of the commonweal and how to best relate to their motivations--presumably, a kingly tool to be wielded later as soldiers are mustered for a questionable foreign war. 

However, one cannot assume Hal's not enjoying himself immensely during his wild salad days. He's witty and loves to banter with the sack-soaked Falstaff, but knows deep down that it shall not last much longer. The beauty of these plays is the depth of the dynamic Prince's characterization and how a few key events subtly disclose Hal's inner hatred and ultimate acceptance of the ambivalence required of a king. This first speech is not yet too cynical, and full of the hope that his prodigal son project will work out in the end.

King Henry IV, First Part, Act I, Sc. II

Henry, Prince of Wales:

I know you all, and will awhile uphold 
The unyok'd humour of your idleness. 
Yet herein will I imitate the Sun, 
Who doth permit the base contagious clouds 
To smother up his beauty from the world, 
That, when he please again to be himself, 
Being wanted, he may be more wonder'd at, 
By breaking through the foul and ugly mists 
Of vapours that did seem to strangle him. 
If all the year were playing holidays, 
To sport would be as tedious as to work; 
But, when they seldom come, they wish'd-for come, 
And nothing pleaseth but rare accidents. 
So when this loose behaviour I throw off, 
And pay the debt I never promised, 
By how much better than my word I am, 
By so much shall I falsify men's hopes; 
And, like bright metal on a sullen ground, 
My reformation, glitt'ring o'er my fault, 
Shall show more goodly and attract more eyes 
Than that which hath no foil to set it off. 
I'll so offend to make offense a skill, 
Redeeming time when men think least I will.

What a piece of work is a man!

Hamlet dangles his antic disposition in front of his boys.

This being one of the most famous of Hamlet's speeches--and one often taken out of the very sarcastic context in which it is meant to be absorbed--I decided to go with the entirety of the monologue to keep it in perspective: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern arrive at Elsinore unexpectedly, and Hamlet immediately figures them out, so he decides to play the ultra emo role he's set up for himself to throw them off the scent of what's really going down.

These two famously indistinguishable flunkies have been summoned to the court by Claudius and Gertrude. They are asked to kindly spy on young Hamlet and report back on the troubled prince's disposition. Starstruck as they are, they agree to this charge and "make love to this employment" as Hamlet puts it. They do this because they are the type of school friend who sends a friend request on Facebook just because they want to increase their friend count and include every single person they ever remembered from middle school and love to point out that "Look, me and the Prince go way back." Imagine if one of those people showed up at your house in the midst of family turmoil. You know your Facebook-troglodytic parents only friended them because they're the only friends they remember you had before college and have no clue that you've actually blocked their updates from your home timeline because their statuses are so soporific and banal you'd rather write whole soliloquies about grass growing than read them and be reminded that you were once inseparable.

Hamlet is insulted by this blatant conspiracy and complete lack of insight into his current social circle. He perhaps wonders if they had asked Horatio at first, and trusts that Horatio turned them down. He knows he has a role to continue playing, so that Claudius does not suspect that Hamlet suspects him of murder. Naturally, he interrogates his old buddies and goes on a non-specific rant about how horrible the world is and laments about the gross, arrogant fallibility of humankind. This way, the boys are no more wise about Hamlet's feigned motivation or his real one. But, methinks there's quite a bit of truth in the cynicism presented for them. Hamlet's disgusted by the state of humanity, or at least the representatives surrounding him, and with very good reason.


Hamlet, Act II, Sc. II
Hamlet: I will tell you why; so shall my anticipation prevent your discovery, 
and your secrecy to the king and queen moult no feather. 
I have of late--but wherefore I know not--lost all my mirth, 
forgone all custom of exercises; 
and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, 
the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most excellent canopy, 
the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, 
why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. 
What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! 
in form and moving how express and admirable! in action how like an angel! 
in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals! 
And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not me: 
no, nor woman neither, though by your smiling you seem to say so. 

Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more

A sight that has many ladies sighing.

I won't promise this won't melt into an infatuative drivel about Sir Ken, because my heart did just that when I first saw his film version of Much Ado About Nothing. I had always adored the antics of Benedick and Beatrice on the page, so imagine the ovarian explosions that occurred when I heard that he had, of course, taken the best male role in the play. Indeed, the film is Sir Ken in fine form, at the top of his game, as a most dashing mofo riding horses and getting baths and wearing tight pants...*ahem*... and this film represents perhaps his most successful achievement in making Shakespeare accessible to modern audiences. 

Much Ado being the original romantic comedy, and a quintessential one at that, it was a perfect choice for adaptation to the screen. And even considering Sir Ken's often... eccentric... casting decisions, this film's actors and actresses actually turned out more or less perfect for their roles. It's a grand delight and I don't believe I have to heap on any more praise than it already has to convince any lover of Shakespeare (or beautifully executed romcoms, which I usually distrust) to watch it for themselves. 

The song featured within the text has a naturally lilting quality that makes it so easy to memorize that I actually made myself memorize a second passage in a week. I chose one of Beatrice's shrewd rants against marriage, which suits my personal tongue-in-cheek position quite nicely. She and her antagonizing lover Benedick spend the entire play railing about love and the differences between men and women. Their war-like wooing is immediately a more passionate and emotional foreplay than the sweet, kind, and honest couple--Hero and Claudio--could ever muster. Their spiteful, witty, verbal thrusts and parries represent the most satisfying love story in all of Shakespeare, IMHO. They are the most intelligent individuals in the story, and the surface tension of their cynycism breaks with the catalyst of dishonor laid upon Hero and Claudio at their doomed wedding. Some things are sacred to these two, and as they eventually find out, they find each other more sacred than anything else.

As Benedick says, "Thou and I are too wise to woo peaceably." In that small statement, using the formal "thou" instead of "you," he betrays the deep respect he has always had for Beatrice. They may ride off into the proverbial sunset knocking each other's heads with frying pans, but when they join forces, all is well... and fantastically entertaining.

Much Ado About Nothing, Act II, Sc. III

Balthasar: Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more,

Men were deceivers ever,

One foot in sea and one on shore,

To one thing constant never.

Then sigh not so, but let them go,

And be you blithe and bonny,

Converting all your sounds of woe

Into Hey, nonny nonny.

Sing no more ditties, sing no mo

Of dumps so dull and heavy.

The fraud of men was ever so,

Since summer first was leavy.

Then sigh not so, but let them go

And be you blithe and bonny,

Converting all your sounds of woe

Into Hey, nonny nonny.


Act II, Sc. I
Beatrice: 
Just, if he send me no husband, for the which blessing I am

at him upon my knees every morning and evening. Lord, I

could not endure a husband with a beard on his face! I had

rather lie in the woollen...

What should I do with him? Dress him in my apparel and

make him my waiting gentlewoman? He that hath a beard

is more than a youth, and he that hath no beard is less than

a man; and he that is more than a youth is not for me, and

he that is less than a man, I am not for him. Therefore I will

even take sixpence in earnest of the bearherd, and lead his

apes into hell...

No, but to the gate, and there will the devil meet me like an

old cuckold with horns on his head, and say, “Get you to

heaven, Beatrice, get you to heaven; here’s no place for you

maids.” So deliver I up my apes and away to Saint Peter. For

the heavens, he shows me where the bachelors sit, and there

live we as merry as the day is long.

O that this too too solid flesh would melt

Our dear Hamlet, the most emo kid on the block--who actually has very legitimate reasons for being so emo--is the master of soliloquizing, and he lays down his first track with uncompromising skill. He's pissed at his mom for marrying his uncle so soon after King Hamlet died, an event so hastily and thriftily executed that "the funeral-baked meats did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables." In this speech, he praises his father to the sky, compares his seemingly grief-proof new "parents" to beasts, calls them incestuous, and then laments that he must keep his trap shut... a self-imposed rule which he proceeds to ignore for five acts.

Hamlet is THIS distraught even BEFORE Horatio conveys the sighting of the king's ghost. And later, Polonius fucks up his love life by berating Ophelia, basically calls her a whore, and forbids her to hang out with Hamlet anymore. Then Claudius and Gertrude set two of Hamlet's flunkies to spy on him because they have no idea why Hamlet is so upset.

This whole family needs an intervention. Or a year's supply of Xanax. Or both.

This soliloquy, for me, is one of the easiest to remember. Its emotion is embedded in the text so deeply and clearly, and the context so plain in its resentment and bemusement that you can't help but begin to chew the scenery as you speak it aloud. Also, I just play Sir Kenneth Branagh's performance of it through my head and it comes naturally. 

Hamlet, Act I, Sc. II

Hamlet: O that this too too solid flesh would melt,

Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew!
Or that the Everlasting had not fix'd 
His canon 'gainst self-slaughter! O God! God!
How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable
Seem to me all the uses of this world
Fie on't! ah, fie! 'Tis an unweeded garden
That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature
Possess it merely. That it should come to this!
But two months dead! Nay, not so much, not two.
So excellent a king, that was to this
Hyperion to a satyr; so loving to my mother
That he might not beteem the winds of heaven
Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth!
Must I remember? Why, she would hang on him
As if increase of appetite had grown
By what it fed on; and yet, within a month-
Let me not think on't! Frailty, thy name is woman!- 
A little month, or ere those shoes were old
With which she followed my poor father's body
Like Niobe, all tears- why she, even she
(O God! a beast that wants discourse of reason
Would have mourn'd longer) married with my uncle;
My father's brother, but no more like my father
Than I to Hercules. Within a month,
Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears
Had left the flushing in her galled eyes,
She married. O, most wicked speed, to post
With such dexterity to incestuous sheets!
It is not, nor it cannot come to good.
But break my heart, for I must hold my tongue! 

Virtue? A fig!

Only Sir Olivier has the stones (and the talent) to play Othello in blackface. Do not try this at home, kids.

Every deceitful villain in literature, film, and pop culture has Iago's DNA in their blood. From Professor Moriarty to Loki, Dennis Nedry to Gollum, anyone who presents themselves as trustworthy while they smile and smile and work to betray our heroes has descended from that granddaddy of evil genius who could drive a man to murder with nought but a wave of a handkerchief. 

With 1097 lines,* Iago is third only to Richard III (1152) and Hamlet (1422) in pure lung power (per play... Hal/Henry V, whose breath sweeps through three plays, has over 1800 lines, and Falstaff has over 1600 in his three appearances). What does he accomplish with all this vocal ability, other than a whole lot of soap operatic trouble?

As with all Shakespearean villains, he speaks hard truths that cannot be cast aside with all his lies. The speech I chose strikes me as one of those particularly obvious observations of human nature. He is honest after all, since Iago is well aware that he is a perfect example of one who has chosen to sow his own seeds of villainy. He is the quintessential example of how WRONG Polonius** is when he utters   

"To thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man." Iago is true to himself, and yet is false to everyone. 

After all his silver-tongued philosophizing, one line haunts me the most. It's Iago's final line in the play, directed at Othello after Iago's one-man complot has been exposed: 

"Demand me nothing; what you know, you know:

From this time forth I never will speak word."

Lodovico's immediate response is "What, not to pray?" and Gratiano grumbles "Torments will ope your lips." But Othello stares at Iago and says "Well, thou dost best."

Iago's felt slighted the entire time, ever since Othello made Cassio his lieutenant, and perhaps even before that, as this line suggests. They appear to have a secret between them, and despite Iago's attempt to ruin Othello's good name, when Iago's honesty is finally stained, the bastard decides to zip his lip. What  have they seen and done together in their battles and voyages? What makes Iago loathe and love Othello so much? Why do I love Iago more than Polonius? Because in the end, Iago is honest.

Othello, Act I, Sc. III

Iago: Virtue! a fig! 'tis in ourselves that we are thus

or thus. Our bodies are our gardens, to the which
our wills are gardeners: so that if we will plant
nettles, or sow lettuce, set hyssop and weed up
thyme, supply it with one gender of herbs, or
distract it with many, either to have it sterile
with idleness, or manured with industry, why, the
power and corrigible authority of this lies in our
wills. If the balance of our lives had not one
scale of reason to poise another of sensuality, the
blood and baseness of our natures would conduct us
to most preposterous conclusions: but we have
reason to cool our raging motions, our carnal
stings, our unbitted lusts, whereof I take this that
you call love to be a sect or scion.

*The actual numbers of lines depend on the version/edition you read, but you get the idea.
**I fucking HATE this quote because everyone uses it out of context and they never seem to realize that everyone in Shakespeare's time understood it to be an empty, banal platitude worthy of so much eye-rolling.

The quality of mercy is not strained

The nonpareil Maggie Smith as the eloquent Portia

Honestly, there are two things I remember most about The Merchant of Venice: the test of the three caskets to win Portia's hand, and the repeated line "pound of flesh" because the taking of which is graphically illustrated in the David Fincher film Se7en. Indeed, the concept of giving a pound of flesh for anything harkens back to this reference in Shakespeare, and the idiom today is meant to convey the idea of an excessive, cruel, and ultimately impossible payment for a debt. It's this debt that the moneylender Shylock wishes the hapless Antonio to pay. Of course, it takes the reasoning of a woman, albeit in drag (doubly so, since the women in Shakespeare's time were played by young boys), to convince Shylock that this is not the best idea on the planet.

The speech I chose feels philosophical, but it's delivered as a legal argument. This logical, articulate monologue doesn't convince Shylock, however, and it takes the threat of losing his material wealth to make him stand down. Portia boldly adopts Shylock's cold literalism and points out that his original bond with Antonio does not include blood, and if he were to take a single drop of blood with the flesh, he would break the contract.

Portia's plea of mercy-seasoned justice is as humanist as they come, and in a canon richly populated by many mighty, merciless males, her words stand up and stand out. I'm proud to make hers the first lady's speech I copy to the book and volume of my brain.

The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, Sc. I

Portia (as Bellario): The quality of mercy is not strained.
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven,
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blessed.
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.
It is mightiest in the mightiest,
It becomes the throned monarch better than his crown.
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
An attribute to awe and majesty.
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings.
But mercy is above this sceptred sway,
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself.
And earthly power dost then become likest God's,
Where mercy seasons justice. Therefore Jew,
Though justice be thy plea, consider this,
That in the course of justice we all must see salvation,
We all do pray for mercy
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render the deeds of mercy.
I have spoke thus much to mitigate the justice of thy plea,
Which if thou dost follow, this strict court of Venice
Must needs give sentance gainst the merchant there.

Lovers and madmen have such seething brains

Bottom and his buddies.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who would love to see Benedict Cumberbatch's Titania and Hugh Laurie's Bottom. And I mean that in exactly the double entendre you're thinking of right now. Too bad my favorite actors aren't always followed around by cameras from the first day they are cast into high school plays. I'd also much rather see what Ben Whishaw would do with Puck than The Tempest's Ariel, but that's another post.

For now, consider Theseus, Duke of Athens, and his dilemma: a bunch of love-sick and drugged-up teenagers from his court get lost in the woods just when the faeries are in the throes of a civil war of the sexes. The kids wake from their stupor and with their fanciful recollection of their "dreams," simply confirm Theseus' worldview that faeries are bullshit. That's the speech I chose--a romantic diatribe about the idiocy of romance. He's such a hipster.


A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act V, Sc. I
Theseus: More strange than true: I never may believe
These antique fables, nor these fairy toys.
Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
More than cool reason ever comprehends.
The lunatic, the lover and the poet
Are of imagination all compact:
One sees more devils than vast hell can hold,
That is, the madman: the lover, all as frantic,
Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt:
The poet's eye, in fine frenzy rolling,
Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;
And as imagination bodies forth
The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen
Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name.
Such tricks hath strong imagination,
That if it would but apprehend some joy,
It comprehends some bringer of that joy;
Or in the night, imagining some fear,
How easy is a bush supposed a bear!

Now is the winter of our discontent

Dali's tribute to Sir Laurence of Olivier's Richard III

I saw this play my first year of college as a requirement of a fun summer session History of Theatre class at UF. The guy who played Richard was one of the TAs in the class, and was quite remarkable. I enjoyed it much more than I thought I would, and all the essential scenes (the wooing of Anne, the murder of Clarence, the ghosts on the field of battle) stuck out even though, at the time, I had no background information about the play whatsoever.

The first 41 lines of Richard III are possibly the most famous first 41 lines in the history of drama. I wasn't even thinking of that when I stared at the seemingly endless mass of words before me. It wasn't a terribly difficult decision to make--it is a glorious statement of a soliloquy and in a play full of memorable moments ("A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse!"), it still stands out as the epitome of a (flawed and twisted) heart unpacked with words.

INTIMIDATION ALERT!

Keep calm and carry on, Caity. Time to break out some technique: tap into the code of the prose, aka, iambic pentameter. By identifying the underlying rhythm of each line, I found the words stuck in my brain like song lyrics, and the task became much easier.

now IS the WINter OF our DISconTENT
made GLORious SUMmer BY this SON of YORK

Now we're cooking with lime.

Following the meter, this modern reader often tripped on syllables ("glorious" is three syllables, no?) that were probably not there 400 years ago. Therefore, something like "glorious" would be crammed into "GLOR-yus" and the difference between "supposed" and "suppos'd" became glaringly obvious after a while. I love English. It's so achingly anal sometimes.

So I tackled this bugger, and though it was a mother of a bastard while I was wrestling with it, it's now one of my favorite ones to recite aloud. Its potential for scene chewing is evident in the words, and for an untrained solo actress like me, it makes the speech that much easier to remember.

Richard III, Act I, Sc. I

Gloucester: Now is the winter of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this sun of York;
And all the clouds that lour'd upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.
Now are our brows bound with victorious wreathes,
Our bruised arms hung up for monuments;
Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings,
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visaged war hath smooth'd his wrinkled front;
And now, instead of mounting barbed steeds
To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,
He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.
But I, that am not shaped for sportive tricks,
Nor made to court an amorous looking-glass;
I, that am rudely stamp'd, and want love's majesty
To strut before a wanton ambling nymph;
I, that am curtail'd of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
Deformed, unfinish'd, sent before my time
Into this breathing world, scarce half made up,
And that so lamely and unfashionable
That dogs bark at me as I halt by them;
Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace,
Have no delight to pass away the time,
Unless to spy my shadow in the sun
And descant on mine own deformity:
And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover,
To entertain these fair well-spoken days,
I am determined to prove a villain
And hate the idle pleasures of these days.
Plots have I laid, inductions dangerous,
By drunken prophecies, libels and dreams,
To set my brother Clarence and the king
In deadly hate the one against the other:
And if King Edward be as true and just
As I am subtle, false and treacherous,
This day should Clarence closely be mew'd up,
About a prophecy, which says that 'G'
Of Edward's heirs the murderer shall be.
Dive, thoughts, down to my soul: here
Clarence comes...

Why, all delights are vain

"Heaven... I'm in heaven..." from Branagh's 2000 film adaptation

Sir Ken is a god of some sort, obviously, but when I realized he had made Love's Labour's Lost into a bonafide Irving berlin-esque musical, I was saying "What's all this now?" Aside from the subjective opinion that Fred-and-Ginger movies are AWESOMESAUCE and Shakespeare is AMAZEBALLS, I initially thought the combination might be less than peanut butter and chocolate perfection.

I was wrong.

My dear Sir Ken made something I personally adore even more than Much Ado About Nothing (amazingly enough, since that's near perfect anyways). Now, LLL is notoriously wordy and while the monologues and dialogues are poetic and clever and beauteous to the nth degree, they can be a tad long-winded. So Ken's vision was a film that replaced the more ludicrously protracted speeches (mostly recited by the incorrigible but whip-smart Berowne) with musical numbers that could more succinctly convey the feelings of the characters in the moment. It totally worked.

There was one speech from Berowne, however, that I was looking forward to hearing Kenneth deliver but never heard because it was usurped by "I'd Rather Charleston," which, honestly, is a darling song I truly enjoy because I had a recording of Fred Astaire singing it with his sister Adele that's just insanely adorable.

That speech, wherein Berowne pleads with Navarre and his buddies about the supposed virtues of study over engaging in more carnal pursuits, amounts to what I'd call a Shakespearean tongue-twister for me. It's light and quick and meant to bewitch and beguile his friends so they don't wish to adopt the rather Spartan rules of their three years of intense study. It's fun to say as quickly as you're able and still is a challenge to deliver.

There's one other lovely speech I considered, from Act 4, Scene 3. Sir Ken, in all his talent and wisdom, decided to include an abridged version of this 77-line mouthful in the film, and begins it by tap dancing in iambic pentameter. Needless to say, this blew my mind and fangirlish ovaries to bits. I promised myself to learn it one day, but for now, I have the following under my belt:

Love's Labour's Lost, Act I, Sc. I

Berowne: Why, all delights are vain; but that most vain,

Which with pain purchased doth inherit pain:

As, painfully to pore upon a book

To seek the light of truth; while truth the while

Doth falsely blind the eyesight of his look:

Light seeking light doth light of light beguile:

So, ere you find where light in darkness lies,

Your light grows dark by losing of your eyes.

Study me how to please the eye indeed

By fixing it upon a fairer eye,

Who dazzling so, that eye shall be his heed

And give him light that it was blinded by.

Study is like the heaven's glorious sun

That will not be deep-search'd with saucy looks:

Small have continual plodders ever won

Save base authority from others' books

These earthly godfathers of heaven's lights

That give a name to every fixed star

Have no more profit of their shining nights

Than those that walk and wot not what they are.

Too much to know is to know nought but fame;

And every godfather can give a name.