I should go shake my ears, shouldn't I?

[capri0mni]

It all started when alto2 infected me with this meme:

Your Score: Problem Plays

You scored 44% = Tragic, 55% = Comic, 21% = Romantic, 19% = Historic

You are the "Problem Plays!" The Problem Plays are a group of Shakespeare's plays that cannot be readily identified as either Tragedies or Comedies because they have an equal amount of both. The Problem Plays often present the protagonist with a situation that must be overcome, but after a toilsome journey, the hero almost always comes out on top! Often called "tragicomedies," the Problem Plays contain elements of dark psychological drama, light-hearted comedy, and a bit of romance. This means you are most likely a well-rounded individual with a perfect balance Tragedy, Romance, and Comedy in your life. While you may experience some hard times along the way, odds are you will fight through them and come out on top!

Link: The Which Shakespeare Play Are You? Test written by macbee on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test View My Profile(macbee)

"Well, 'one of the Problem Plays' is all right," thought I, "as long as that includes The Winter's Tale. I quite like The Winter's Tale; All's Well That Ends Well and Measure for Measure, not quite as much." (I mean, they're both fine plays, as thought-provoking dramas go, but I wouldn't like to have the personality of either).

So then, I hopped over to Wikipedia, just to see what someone(s) said about that ("Some" include The Winter's Tale in that group of plays, but it's not unanimous).

Then, from the article on Problem Plays, I hopped over to the Winter's Tale article. And down toward the bottom, in the section on notable productions, was this sentence: "In 1980, David Jones (director), former Associate Artistic Director of the Royal Shakespeare Company chose to launch his new theatre company at the Brooklyn Academy of Music with The Winter's Tale starring Brian Murray supported by Jones' new company at BAM.[5]". And the more I think about it, the more certain I am that I was in the audience for one of those performances. That was the year I was 16, and that would have been the year I was in tenth grade, when Don Fried was my English teacher, and had us studying Shakespeare. We weren't reading Winter's Tale for class, but he thought it important that we see Shakespeare acted, live, and if we did, we'd understand it (mostly), so we had a field trip into The City to see a Matinee. And I am pretty sure it was at the BAM.

Anyway, that got me all squeeful, remembering sitting in the audience, and thinking about how The Winter's Tale needs more defending, especially against the charge that Shakespeare didn't change much at all from his main source, except for a few changes in the names, and a few new characters.

So, now, I've got it into my head to read the entire source novel for the play (Pandosto, by Robert Greene) -- 20,000 or so words of 1595 English, with efs for esses, and all, so I can be sure of my points -- for no other reason than research for an LJ post. See what I mean?

I'm mad. A real Jennet!

Hee-Haw!

Comments

[capriuni.livejournal.com]

They'd have been fine with black Englishman, but apparently there wasn't one available - or, at least, none that the director felt was up to the role.

Oh, I understand that...

But that just underlines a different sort of racism. Such asL How hard did they actually look for a black actor? And/or why are there so few blacks in the British Actors Union (this goes back, too, the perrenial DW comment about how all Timelords are white ;-)