Arghhh... Die Shakespeare!!!

[HighintheClouds]

Argh!!! Hamlet... Die DIE DIE DIE DIIIIEEEEEE!!!!!!

Sorry... Am supposed to read Hamlet for English and it's getting really irritating...

It's not so much the play and dialogue itself, for it's an interesting play and it sounds like beautiful poetry at times but it's just... the footnotes are LONGER than the actual play itself! It's bad enough trying to understand Shakespearean English. It's even worse when you have to read explanations which go on and on and on (see attachment for self-explanatory picture)!

I just needed to rant.. Thank you EC....

[Wander]

The only thing slower than reading Shakespeare is reading The Scarlet Letter. COMMAS EVERYWHERE.

Surprisingly enough, Shakespeare beat you to it. He's dead already.

Oh and just so you feel even better, Hamlet dies too! (I hope I didn't spoil it.)

I played Claudius in Dogg's Hamlet. Hilarious play, btw.

[SpacerX]

There are some top-quality study guides for Shakespear's works. Footnotes can be tedious at times and really boring. Might I suggest browsing just one of the millions of websites dedicated to understanding Shakespear?

Reading various different study guides can give you a different perspective on the play and lead to a more general understanding as a whole. Worked for me anyway

I just thought of something else that could help you! For realsies this time.

Read it out loud with friends! It is a play afterall and it is meant to be performed. Assign each person a character (or do them all with different voices). Reading each scene outloud once and then going back to go over footnotes may make for an easier read.

[Apocalypte]

If you can find York Notes, they can be quite useful for studying Shakespeare.

That said, I still have nightmares about studying King Lear.

two words

SPARKS NOTES

and yes I had to do shakespeare all through high school, Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth and Hamlet

[JurrBurr]

OMG I hate Shakespeare too! ATM, We are reading Julius Caesar!

[interstella]

GRRRRRR... Right now I want to rip my copy of Macbeth apart. I hate Shakespeare too :P

[kh23172]

I have english next semester, and we're going to get to Hamlet ( i think ).. im sooo looking forward to it now!

[SpacerX]

I studied The Merchant of Venice, King Lear, and Macbeth.

Lear was the longest but it was quite interesting at times. Macbeth was cool, Lady Macbeth was a great character.

Originally Posted by Wander

The only thing slower than reading Shakespeare is reading The Scarlet Letter. COMMAS EVERYWHERE.

Gah. Guess what we're reading at the moment in American Literature. Yep, the Scarlet effing Letter.

As far as Shakespeare, I've only had to read Romeo & Juliet, and I quite enjoyed it. But that may be because I got to play Juliet (fully outfitted with red dress, stuffed bra, and makeup) for a mini-production video of R&J

[Wander]

Originally Posted by JBBB

OMG I hate Shakespeare too! ATM, We are reading Julius Caesar!

I just finished with Julius Caesar, and really...it's probably one of the easier plays to understand. The language isn't quite as hard and the basis in history makes it easier to follow. It's still a very slow read, but not that bad.

[kh23172]

Originally Posted by Drizzt DoUrden

Gah. Guess what we're reading at the moment in American Literature. Yep, the Scarlet effing Letter.

As far as Shakespeare, I've only had to read Romeo & Juliet, and I quite enjoyed it. But that may be because I got to play Juliet (fully outfitted with red dress, stuffed bra, and makeup) for a mini-production video of R&J

The Scarlet Letter is not THAT bad.. on my SAT exam the essay was about compromise, and I used an example for compromises from the book. My friend had once told me that the key to a perfect score on the SAT writing section was to use a historical, personal, and literary example. I used the fact that the Puritan society compromised with Hester to allow her to stay in the village as a compromise, versus expelling her from the village in the first place, which is normally what a Puritan society would have done when handling adultery. I got a perfect score on the written section..

Originally Posted by Wander

The only thing slower than reading Shakespeare is reading The Scarlet Letter. COMMAS EVERYWHERE.

OMG. I totally wanted to BURN my copy of Scarlet Letter as soon as I finished it. ARG. I hated that book with a passion lol

I read Hamlet last year, and yeah, I thought I wanted to read it since it's pretty psychological, but, hmm, the play's footnotes are SO incredibly long and annoying.
My bit of advise: Read through whatever pages/act/scene without reading the footnotes, then reading through it for a second and read the footnotes.
Helped me when we read Othello. Much more confusing in my opinion

[SlickyPants]

Whoa, this material stinks. I'm going to have to punch it up on the fly! Oh, I got one.

How do you make a King Lear?

Put the Queen in a bikini!

[Booing from the audience]

Here's another one:

"Knock, knock."
"Who's there?"
"Juliet."
"Juliet who?"
"Juli-Ate so much pasta fagioli, Romeo doesn't want her anymore!"

[More boos]

Ooh. Tough crowd. They're booing Shakespeare!

[Kryz]

PSH those are a lot of footnotes

Have seen lots more in ancient greek translations, but, this ain't a translation :S
I don't have to read shakespeare or anything like that here for school luckly.

Good luck @ comprehensing it!

[dictionary]

Your book dosent seem to be verry user friendly the version that my school uses has the notes to the side of what was said and they are just basic things to let you know what they are saying....

Gotta love Rosencrantz and Guildenstern....

[Mikeyy]

I actually quite like A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Then again, I did it for drama, not English.

[Kimi]

Originally Posted by Wander

The only thing slower than reading Shakespeare is reading The Scarlet Letter. COMMAS EVERYWHERE.

Read both. More like forced to read both in my english class back in high school.
I only wish my english teacher would die so there will be no more Shakespeare

Pretty innocent eh?