To think Shakespeare is boring and crap !

[Lardlizard]

Bloody hate it

Anyone who can watch this speech from Henry V performed well and pronounce it ‘boring and crap’ is really, seriously, well...wrong. It gives me goosebumps just to read it.

And while thou
livest, dear Kate, take a fellow of plain and
uncoined constancy; for he perforce must do thee
right, because he hath not the gift to woo in other
places: for these fellows of infinite tongue, that
can rhyme themselves into ladies' favours, they do
always reason themselves out again. What! a
speaker is but a prater; a rhyme is but a ballad. A
good leg will fall; a straight back will stoop; a
black beard will turn white; a curled pate will grow
bald; a fair face will wither; a full eye will wax
hollow: but a good heart, Kate, is the sun and the
moon; or, rather, the sun, and not the moon; for it
shines bright and never changes, but keeps his
course truly. If thou would have such a one, take
me; and take me, take a soldier; take a soldier,
take a king.

😍

Stupid app killed the formatting. ^

Macbeth is good. Not boring and some memorable speeches.

a lot of modern stuff on tv etc is boring and crap but many people still watch it.

This in bucketloads! If you find Shakespeare boring and crap it's probably because you don't understand his works. The boring and crap TV is dumbing down society.

We still today use words and phrases Shakespeare invented. The English language would not be the same without him. He is the greatest writer in the English language, four hundred years after he died.

Phrases Shakespeare invented

Words Shakespeare invented

Hey nonny nonny.

I love the tragedies. King Lear is my favourite.

The comedies are a bit tiresome to read/study, but if you see a good production, they’re better.

The OP must be both cowardly and bored. Who puts out a potentially polarising AIBU and then runs away from the argument. Get a life OP.

He was a genious but not to everyones taste. The language is tricky to get your heas around but once you do it is extremely clever and full of puns .
I don't think it is irrelevant today....power, love, ambition and death are all universal topics now as they were back then.

Genius

Head..sorry for typos!

I can't really be bothered to argue, but they're stories about life - about ambition, greed, betrayal, grief, love, friendship, jealousy etc etc

And some of it is just written so beautifully.

So many references and phrases in life are references from Shakespeare.

To find it boring is to find life boring I'm afraid.

To say I don't understand it is different, but there are lots of easy versions which tell the story without the complex language (is Charles and Mary Lamb the classic for this?).

Yes, Charles and Mary Lamb. I read this as a kid as well as watched the simplified BBC half hour animations that they did in the 90s.

blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/product/9781435166745?gC=5a105e8b&gclid=CjwKCAjwztL2BRATEiwAvnALcusDX0rkI-9lcUeD5yudN-qRJn3Etek8zAmtf3m66fWBX2aq46hOBxoCcBsQAvD_BwE

Marlowe, is that you?

😀😀😀😀

I find reading Shakespeare nearly impossible, but love seeing plays on stage. OP - have you been to The Globe?
It was Kenneth Branagh who introduced me to Shakespeare

www.mooc-list.com/tags/william-shakespeare

Equally, it's very difficult to understand what he's trying to say because of the developments in language

And yet teenagers manage it year after year. Ever thought that the problem might not be Shakespeare?

All my friends love it. They still go to Statford and look up which one to see next.
I found it hard to understand, a different era, largely boring. Twelfth Night and King Lear? No thanks.
It seems it's not fashionable to say this though.

My favourite book is A Thousand Splendid Suns
by Khaled Hosseini. I did an MA in Russian Literature. So it's not as though I don't appreciate good stuff.

Just not Shakespeare. But if you say it, you are mocked. As if you are some sort of Dimwit.

His work is not written in very old English. Fair enough if you don't enjoy it and struggle to understand it but it's not ' a form of very old English.'

Well it is old English. It may be recognised English, but it was still in the very early transition from the English of the Middle Ages. It’s like saying you recognise a house, even though only the foundations are built.

Saying all the stories are utterly boring, including modern retellings, is just ridiculous. What, all of them? Just utterly boring? Ok.

I said most retellings are boring. For such a great reader, you unfortunately didn’t manage to read my post correctly .

Goodness, people really get shirty when you dare diss old Will, don’t they? The modern equivalent is telling people you don’t like The Big Bang Theory. They like berating you for not being smart enough to find it funny, when the truth is underneath all the smart jargon is nothing but crassness. If it makes people feel a bit more clever liking it though, each to their own.

My grammer school in the 70s drained all the life out of Shakespeare. The teaching was dire and soulless. Then I saw The Tempest with Derek Jacobi and was absolutely blown away. I've been in love with the plays ever since.

@endofthelinefinally - we saw that Comedy of Errors with Lenny Henry too. DC were young at the time, but they loved it. They were chuckling away. The woman who played Adriana was fantastic too. Live a Real Housewives of Syracuse.

I LOVE Shakespeare. The language is a little bit hard sometimes, but his insight into human behaviour is second to none. Way more astute and subtle than Chaucer.

The English of the Middle Ages also isn't 'old English'. By its very definition , it is Middle English. I defy anyone to read any Old English and still say they can't follow Shakespeare more easily!

Students I teach often groan as a kind of Pavlov's Dogs at the mention of Shakespeare. Within a few lessons, they are generally hooked.

Shakespeare is incredibly popular worldwide and we probably ought to be proud that the most famous and long lasting writer of all time is British.

Of course you find Shakespeare boring! Too many stagings are full of dynastic poshos overacting in an unintentionally comical, highly mannered way. Branagh/Thompson/Gielgud/Redgrave/ad nauseum/snooze. I blame the Olivier fad. What you want is a production starring fine actors with strong regional accents instead of the deadly dull RP. Brings it to life. Alun Armstrong, for example, is wonderful. One of my old university teachers always said the sonnets were best read in a full-on Scouse accent and he was right. There's a flatness to many Shakespeare interpretations. It needs life, warmth and a bit of coarseness.

Fully agree with PPs whose comment's I've just seen - Lenny Henry is just superb with that beautiful voice of his.

I loath it, so boring.