To think Shakespeare is boring and crap !

[Lardlizard]

Bloody hate it

The problem is the way it's taught by some crap teachers who are unable to properly explain the context and bring it to life. Loads of people instinctively hate it because it was taught badly at a time of their life (teenage years) when their minds were busy with other things.

You really have to be taught it properly, either at school, or by self-teaching in later life. It's not something that you can pick up and expect to understand.

Oh God, not you again.

@Lardlizard has a habit of starting threads like this - just an OP and nothing else.

What do you get out of it?

Shakespeare is so relevant still, as several of the more recent productions from RSC, Donmar Warehouse or Almeida show. YABU to say it's all crap. Doesn't mean you have to like it. We're all different.

The ones I like are the one I studied at school, so I know them well enough. (Julius Caeser and Macbeth.) (Actually also studied Twelfth Night and didn't like it.)

I've seen the Tempest and didn't like it. The Taming of the Shrew was mildly amusing.

OK, I like Romeo and Juliet, despite not having studied it.

Not sure that I've seen any of the histories.

It’s not boring and crap just because you don’t like it.

I really like Shakespeare, but I don't think it's a question of 'reasonable'. It's just personal taste.

I don't understand every single word (and I've taught Shakespeare to university students, though it's not my specialism), and I don't think it should matter. If you're bothered, find an edition and look it up. But I don't understand every word in Eastenders, either. I get the gist.

I like the way you can mess around with Shakespeare, because he's so well known, and keep doing different slants on the same plays.

I think one of the main problems with people finding it inacessible, dull, etc is that it wasn't written to be studied on the page - it was written to be performed. If anyone is - or has DC who are - struggling with studying it, find a decent performance on YouTube/BBC/one of the many performances currently being broadcast, and watch it. Maybe (heresy!) even read a plot summary first - it really helps to have a clue what's going on.

I absolutely agree with the PPs who've said once you can, get to Stratford and see a production there. I have been several times a year for the last few years, and although I've seen some very weird ones, I've never seen a dud.

I didn't get Shakespeare at all in school. The two things that changed it for me were seeing it live as it was never meant to be read like a book. The second back in the day was reading the play using Spark notes, where they translated it into modern language. Once I got what was going on, I could start to appreciate it more.

But at the end of the day it is subjective. I love Chaucer because I had an amazing lecturer who was very passionate about him and made all of us passionate in turn. But I loathe Thomas Hardy and Charles Dickins, who others love

My absolute favourite is Much Ado. I love Beatrice

In my early 20s I read a lot of the classics, I thought I was very academic and all that. Tolstoy, Conrad, James Joyce, Dickens, etc. Most of it was dull as shit. It was only when I got older and less insecure that I realised that you can be intelligent and not like that kind of stuff.

Each to their own, but his work was quite varied.

I've just watched the Hollow Crown- Richard ll & loved it.
Just started Henry lV part 1 & can't get into it at all, despite the good cast!

Saw a production of Comedy of Errors & it was hilarious. The actors had to stop at one point as the audience was laughing so much.

Hamlet at Tolethorpe Hall many years ago was great as well-very atmospheric.

There are just as many dirty jokes in Shakespeare as there are in Chaucer!

I think the dirty jokes in both are often the bits that translate least well. Not always. But sometimes they're really hammed up, because people want to be sure you don't miss them, or they're at the level of 'bums are well funny innit'.

Saw Much ado about nothing set in the second world war. It was very amusing.

Well you know perfectly well you are wrong OP so am guessing you are just bored (again) and posting a daft thread on Mumsnet (yet again).

Honestly, there are some great shows on Netflix and I-Player to pass your time.

I think as a society we’re becoming lazier about our entertainment- we don’t really want to have to make effort or to participate actively. I know people who would never watch a foreign film if they had to read subtitles for example. It’s obviously personal choice if you don’t want to read them or watch a performance but it doesn’t qualify you to declare them all boring & crap.

hahaha I agree I loathe them all. They are super boring and irrelevant to today. I spent years studying them*

What???? Macbeth is a story of love, ambition, greed - as topical today as ever!! Othello is a story of love, lust, jealousy - ditto. The tragedies are just fabulous.

Shame you spent years studying them and can't find a good thing to say about them...

@livefornaps

Ha!

You need the key to unlock Shakespeare and once you 'get' him, you realise how fantastic he was. Genius.

I love Shakespeare. If you want boring then Austen should be your thing. Dear God, I have to jab myself awake with a pencil whenever she's around.

Yes. YABU. Watch some of the amazing NT Live performances, they really bring the plays to life.

Saw Much ado about nothing set in the second world war. It was very amusing.

I saw that production (probably) a few months ago - good fun.

The thing is, there are good productions and terrible ones. Some of the stage to screen showings have been pretty good. But there are a few live performances which will always stick in my mind: the first Shakespeare play we took DD to was The Tempest, at the Minack theatre - and it rained (just a bit) at precisely the right time. Or The Merchant of Venice ... I've seen some stinkers of this, but one shockingly good production framed in the context of the Jewish concentration camp prisoners forced to put on shows for their Nazi overlords ... hard to describe but astonishingly and uncomfortably moving.

Othello is an amazing play btw. Saw Ian McKellen, Zoe Wanamaker and Willard White at the RSC. Wonderful.

Wouldn't have chosen boring and crap as a description but it's not really my cup of tea

Shakespeare isn't really meant to be read. Reading any play is dull. Have you ever tried reading a script for a TV show or film you like? It's hard work and nowhere near as good as watching it. You need to see Shakespeare acted to appreciate it.

seeing it live as it was never meant to be read like a book

I honestly wish they wouldn't 'do' Shakespeare for gcse English lit, as a compulsory subject, analysing text rather than watching plays. It absolutely killed DD's enjoyment of the plays for a while. (Tbf she was unlucky to get Romeo and Juliet and love poetry, the other set got Othello and 'conflict'. )