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Two Shakespeare Quotes Dissing School
Some people may think Shakespeare is difficult, elitist, old-fashioned, or whatever else they don’t like, but nothing could be further from the truth. Like all permanently classic works–Mozart’s...
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Joyce On Shakespeare
“He reflected on the pleasures derived from literature of instruction rather than of amusement as he himself had applied to the works of William Shakespeare more than once for the solution of difficult...
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College Textbooks
A recent article includes college textbooks among the biggest consumer rip offs in America. Yup. Releasing superfluous new editions is a favorite trick of publishers. Why do we need brand new algebra...
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Shakespeare’s Histories Are Pretty Gangsta
Betrayal. Revenge. Conspiracy. Murdering your way up the ladder of power. People usually associate these plot elements with Shakespeare’s tragedies, but I see them operate most strongly in his...
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King Lear Reimagined As a Band of Five
In my project of reading the complete works of Shakespeare this year (currently at 33 down, 5 to go), I read King Lear for a second time. Something that struck me is just how complementary the five...
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Every Play By Shakespeare, Ranked And Graded
Last year I read everything Shakespeare wrote. Here now are my final notes on the plays. The grades only represent how much I enjoyed reading each work; they are not meant to be an objective measure...
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9 Blue Jokes in Shakespeare That Made Me Laugh
I admit, these juvenile gags gave me a giggle, and I kept track of them in my notes. In chronological order: #9. Guys get teased about someone sleeping with their mother. Shakespeare is full of...
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Irresponsible Shakespeare
A Midsummer Night’s Dream: just another literary classic where young people’s problems are solved by mind-altering drugs.Filed under: Humor, Language and Literature
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“Relatable” Reading
There’s a popular trope among students (and many teachers) that the things people read should be “relatable,” meaning that stories should reflect the ideas, cultures, and even ethnicities of the...
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Two Great Shakespeare Documentaries
Miramax recently put online their “Shakespeare in the Classroom” feature, produced as part of the 1999 film Shakespeare in Love. This is great news for teachers whose VHS copies died long ago. The...
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Patrick Stewart Performs Shakespeare’s “This Sceptered Isle” Speech
I like each of the four versions in this video, but the final one–starting at 5:35 and delivered by Patrick Stewart, from the Richard II segment of The Hollow Crown–really gives me chills. Filed under:...
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Shakespeare’s Best Female Character
She’s in a poem that’s rarely read. Not only is she Shakespeare’s best female character, she’s his second best character overall (darn you, Hamlet!). She’s Lucrece, of the long narrative poem The Rape...
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Sundays With Shakespeare
I put together a small book of 52 Shakespeare and scripture quotes, as a weekly spiritual devotional. From the Amazon description: “Each entry has a title based on the theme and a quote from scripture...
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New Video: All 38 of Shakespeare’s Plays Ranked
Since putting it up here over two years ago, my post grading and ranking the plays of Shakespeare has become by far the most popular thing I’ve ever written. It’s been the #1 post here almost every day...
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Combining Shakespeare and Tolkien
In Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, a character calls a short young woman he doesn’t like a “dwarf.” One enterprising summer school student, doing a creative writing review of the play, took...
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