Reflecting on the oeuvre of Shakespeare, I can’t shake a perverse idea: the Bard is underrated. And I think this feeling is tied to the contradictory knowledge that he is enormous, creating the master shadow in which all others dissolve. He’s the Platonic Form that has made possible, via subsequent authorial study and unconscious absorption, so many of the variations of what we consider the best in literature. The introspection and characterization of Woolf. The zaniness in Melville, Pynchon, and David Foster Wallace. That ‘disease’, love, in Proust. The soul-searching and linguistic proficiency of Joyce. The paradoxical mix of nihilism and hope in McCarthy. The exuberant wordplay of Nabokov. The tragicomedy of Faulkner. Dostoevksy’s meditations on evil, ambition, and the horrifying acts of which we are capable. It’s all there, centuries prior, in the great prolepsis that is Shakespeare.

LOVE

Hang there like fruit, my soul,
Till the tree die.
-Cymbeline
t
tttt What you do,
Still betters what is done. When you speak, sweet,
I’d have you do it ever: when you sing,
I’d have you buy and sell so, so give alms,
Pray so, and, for the ord’ring your affairs,
To sing them too: when you do dance, I wish you
A wave o’ the sea, that you might ever do
Nothing but that, move still, still so,
And own no other function. Each your doing,
So singular in each particular,
Crowns what you are doing, in the present deeds,
That all your acts are queens.
-The Winter’s Tale

Troilus: This is the monstruosity in love, lady: that the will is infinite,
and the execution confined: that the desire is boundless, and the
act a slave to limit.
Cressida: They say all lovers swear more performance than they are able,
and yet reserve an ability that they never perform: vowing more
than the perfection of ten, and discharging less than the tenth
part of one.
-Troilus and Cressida

But to be frank and give it thee again;
And yet I wish but for the thing I have.
My bounty is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep: The more I give to thee
The more I have, for both are infinite.
-Romeo and Juliet

So in considering what Shakespeare anticipated and achieved, the underrating is almost inevitable. But I also think it’s related to the perception that reading Shakespeare is the literary equivalent of forcing yourself to eat healthier, to drag yourself to the gym, to decline a night out in order to guarantee adequate sleep. It’s good for us, so let’s get on with it (or, more often, not). Likely this sense of unpleasant edification is instilled in grade school, at which time most of us are confronted with a confusing combination of experiences upon being assigned a Shakespeare play: that of hearing the Bard’s work extolled to impossible heights by our teacher, and the disappointment of the actual, difficult, strangely-worded reading experience.

But are most of Shakespeare’s plays even edifying? And if so, edifying in what sense? Aesthetically, the answer is unequivocal, but as with the imbibing of Dostoevksy’s Underground Man, the absorption of many of these plays* with their nihilistic and misanthropic aspects can lead to feelings of deep disquiet and a heightened awareness that seems at once empowering and exquisitely desolate. For me, there’s something almost unhealthily addicting about Shakespeare; it’s as if he’s holding up a fun-house mirror in which I can see life as it almost is, or could be, or would be if it weren’t for certain social pressures or any number of complicating aspects that Shakespeare can and does control in his plotting. Or maybe it even shows life as it actually is, and me as I really am. And so I can’t turn away, seeking ever for a clearer, deeper, more complete vision of what I can’t help but feel is true and painful and intoxicating and sick and erotic and poignant and disappointing.

* e.g. Troilus and Cressida, All’s Well That Ends Well, The Merchant of Venice, King Lear, Measure for Measure, Othello, Hamlet, Macbeth, et al.

DEATH

This world’s a city full of straying streets,
And death’s the market-place, where each one meets.
-The Two Noble Kinsmen

ttIf I must die,
I will encounter darkness as a bride
And hug it in mine arms.
-Measure for Measure

I wasted time, and now doth time waste me.
-Richard II

To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
-Macbeth

In spite of the depravity he often shares with us in his plays and in spite of what has historically crept into criticism, Shakespeare is anything but moralistic. Redeemed characters generally remain problematic, and most of the wedded endings leave the audience with more discomfort than joy, aware that these relationships are doomed based on five acts of intimation. Shakespeare’s not out to steer us toward or away from something; rather, he shows us the abyss into which, being born, we all must sink—an abyss lined with delights, sparse and temporary as they may be, that encourage us to say with Falstaff: “Give me life.”

LIFE

I like not such grinning honour as Sir Walter hath. Give me life;
which if I can save, so: if not, honour comes unlooked for,
and there’s an end.
-Henry IV, Part I

The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together; our
virtues would be proud if our faults whipp’d them not, and our
crimes would despair if they were not cherish’d by our virtues.
-All’s Well That Ends Well

Shallow: Ha, cousin Silence, that thou hadst seen that that this knight
and I have seen! Ha, Sir John, said I well?
Falstaff: We have heard the chimes at midnight, Master Shallow.
-Henry IV, Part II

‘Tis still a dream: or else such stuff as madmen
Tongue and brain not: either both, or nothing,
Or senseless speaking, or a speaking such
As sense cannot untie. Be what it is,
The action of my life is like it, which
I’ll keep, if but for sympathy.
-Cymbeline

“You can’t really sum that geezer up, really, in a nifty sentence. Because everything about him is contrary.” This is Noel Gallagher on Morrissey, but it could very well be describing the genius of the Bard, whose ostensible breadth of human knowledge and internal experience is nonpareil. Socrates’ unexamined life may not be worth living, but internalizing Shakespeare would certainly seem to satisfy the requirement. His plays and sonnets give the impression of containing the full range of human emotions and motivations, of existing as the Hegelian Absolute that comprises all dialectical opposites (or “contraries”, to stick with the Morrissey comparison). Reading Shakespeare, as with Proust’s novel, has been one of those impossibly rewarding experiences, provoking endless reflection on the world, on existence, on others, on myself. And yet, having finished the complete writings, I already know that Nabokov was correct in insisting that "curiously enough, one cannot read a book; one can only reread it."

Any edition but this.

Can't speak for individual volumes, but the text on the Complete edition is lousy, unglossed, often with intrusive editorial choices. One of their concerns is that the plays should be considered theatrical pieces. No duh. Problem is, this is a *book*, to be *read*, not watched. They presumptuously edit the plays as if they were scripts, when there are a thousand theater directors who are perfectly capable of handling that task. Ultimately, this leads to the splitting of some of the more famous works, like "King Lear". Pre-Taylor & Wells, editors simply indicated Folio or quarto provenance in the gloss, and properly conflated the text so that we could get all of Shakespeare's words. Shakespeare himself never bothered editing and collecting his plays (he was more fastidious about his long poems like "Venus and Adonis"). Evidently he didn't care about printing some kind of Ultimate Director's Edition of his plays, and he certainly had the time and means to do that. (Jonson & others did do that with their own plays.) Why Wells & Taylor are so concerned about it, when he wasn't, is mystifying.

The worst of it is that these guys seem hell-bent on stripping Shakespeare of authorship as much as possible. According to Wells & Taylor, half the plays are "co-written" by some lesser light, based on zero evidence. Their latest folly is attributing half of the "Henry VI" plays to Christopher Marlow, again with zero evidence. (Shakespeare's contemporary Robert Greene certainly "blamed" Shakespeare for those plays, but hey, what the heck did he know, right?)

If you want as much of Shakespeare's words with the least amount of modern literary quackery, try any other edition.

Makes me feel sad that people dislike Will due to the way he was introduced to them at school. He’s one of the funniest writers ever. Sorry, clever, sad, empathetic. As you like it is still one of my fave plays ever.

I did it.

38 plays, 2 long poems, and 154 sonnets in 2462 onion-paper pages. I read them all. ALL. I think I deserve a self-congratulation for this. Yes. Good job!

It took me more than two months of intense reading that toughened my wrists and arms from reading it on the train standing, hardened my heart with stony indifference against people's perplexed and peering gazes thrown at me even to the point of leaning in from the side to see what the hell I'm reading, and made me utterly fearless against any future reference to Shakespeare.

From the end of January to today, April 5th, it was a long journey during which time I came out of Shakespearean depths only once to take a quick breather for five days and read one contemporary book. It was a long, long read indeed.

So what do I think of his works? Amazing. If you speak English, read them.

My favorite comedies are The Comedy of Errors, The Midsummer Night's Dream , All's Well That Ends Well, and of course, my absolute favorite, The Merchant of Venice. As for histories, Henry IV part 1&2, Henry V, and Richard III were fascinating and beautiful in myriad aspects. It seems like I'm drawn to wicked villains like Richard III, Shylock, and Barabas (Marlowe's The Jew of Malta), though I didn't absolutely love Iago from Othello for some reason.

And tragedies. Oh man. I read Macbeth and Julius Caesar in high school and middle school respectively, but I can say I understood less than 10% of their artistic merit now that I read them again. Macbeth is just a short, sweet, and wicked play with enchanting poetry, and the speeches in Julius Caesar are just mind-blowing in their poetry and rhetoric.

Romeo and Juliet definitely belongs to one of his greatest works. It's got the engaging story, beautiful language, and comic scenes all rolled in one - everything that makes a work of art entertaining and satisfying to people from all walks of life. Cymbeline is also awesome. The ending just so unrealistic that it's unbelievably satisfying. Hamlet is like a given and I don't think I need to say anything about it other than that it rocks.

Oh and I really liked this minor play, Titus Andronicus, considered by many critics to be one of his inferior plays. Granted, the beginning is just absolute shit at least plot-wise, but man, it's AWESOME with all that bloody murders and plotting and hatred and violence. It may be poetically inferior to other tragedies, but story-wise, it holds its own among his corpus.

I did it!

It's Shakespeare

There is no other who can play with words and ideas as well. It is Shakespeare. What more can I say?

Read so far:

*The Tempest
*The Two Gentlemen of Verona - 3 Stars (It's been a while seen I've read Shakespeare. Was this one easier, or had I gotten better at old-timey English?)

The Godfather of the Stars

William Shakespeare did not invent the English language. He didn't dream up most of the stories he wrote in his plays and poetry. Much of it he expounded on from history and myth. Much of the human nature exhibited could be witnessed on any given day in the taverns and churches of Europe. A good deal of the morality and tone is structured on the Bible and Christian moral tones. (Much has been written about Shakespeare and the Bible as an individual topic, because the Bishop's Bible was the one read in the church services he would have attended. And, you can see its influence.) But, as Mr. Shakespeare himself in Love's Labour's Lost, referred to astronomers as 'the godfathers of the stars;' Shakespeare gave names to all our human griefs, joys, sorrows, tragedies, and loves. He named the human soul with his plays.

Remarkably, what most appears from the great richness of the pen of 'the Bard' is the beloved characters with which he has peopled the world of our imaginations. I can see them now with my eyes open. (If I may here address the characters from the pages of Mr. Shakespeare's great work...)

Why come on in King Henry V. You were so anxious to take up your crown from your dead Father's bed, young man, so you will be first in the room. With all your mistakes, you lit the stage in your moments of glorious triumph. Whether watching you slay brave Hotspur in hand-to-hand combat, or rise above the folly of your youth... I could forgive your eagerness to devour the lands of France. I couldn't help but wonder in amazement how your great General Talbot, who outlived you into the story of Henry VI, remained as the last of his age, a lasting legacy of your greatness.

Ho, you there Shylock the Jew, from The Merchant of Venice! You are in excellent company with the likes of this young King Harry, are you not?! Yet, your race dictated that you would be the villain of your story, to King Henry's hero. My heart boils with the injustice you were served. Perhaps, you should have been more eager to forgive your 'pound of flesh' debt while you were 'in the way' with your enemy. Instead of learning to curse your enemies from the fallen Queen Margaret, (Henry VI's French Queen) you should have taken other tutors.

Take Prospero there from The Tempest, he is an apt example of forgiving and for getting a son-in-law from his enemy. (Come closer blithe Ariel, I can barely see you.) Katherine of Aragon remained graceful, in the face of great wrong, when her husband King Henry VIII divorced her. Yet, I see you too, who would not forgive and forget: Othello, you Moor of Venice, quick to love and quicker to hatred. You murdered an innocent wife. Tamora, captive Queen of the Goths, your revenge brought down all those around you. The poison of your vengeance you drank from the cup of un-forgiveness General Titus served you when he would not spare your son. Tell me, Titus. Did you know, when you silenced the captive Queen that your sons would be silenced from defense before banishment, you silenced before execution, and your daughter...? So much silence reverberates through the centuries.

I have few words with which to instruct any of you great characters. But, I see the Fool there from King Lear's stage. He will have plenty to say, and of so much wisdom that we all should be glad to listen for hours to your good advice. It was such a pity that neither King Lear nor his daughters learned anything from you.

'Lay on Macduff!' I'll have a word with you there in the shadows. Whose wisdom pointed you to young Malcolm to woo him to his father's deadly sepulcher of a throne? Didn't Malcolm himself tell you that he just knew all the evil that would come from himself if he had so much power as a crown upon his head?! Blood cries out for more blood, I suppose. (I'm looking at the two of you Macbeth and Lady Macbeth.)

Poor, troubled Hamlet, yet you took time to verify that the visions tormenting you were truly the ghost of your father, before confronting your uncle. Too bad your ending couldn't have been less rotten in Denmark. Falstaff, you were such a 'false staff' for your young friend the Prince. You should have known better at your age, yet you died in your folly after he rose to the throne.

Enough! Away with you all, and back to the pages, 'ere I close this heavy book!

Dear prospective readers of Shakespeare, let me say a bit about this and that and the other before I leave you with some quotes across the spectrum, and video links. The play that seemed to lack the most was the last, Henry VIII. There, all that was really interesting was the wives... of course... why else read Henry VIII, but to see his wives? And, they were notable. The play that shines the most to me now is that of Pericles and his daughter Marina who was born in a tempest. That is indeed a fascinating tale for all ages! The other that I would mention is Queen Elizabeth herself. Picture the Queen of England sitting before the stage, listening to the great Shakespeare tell her stories of her grandparents. I imagine the little princess inside her marveled as he swept her away with his wonderful way of making sense and destiny of all that has come before us on this great stage.

I first read all of Shakespeare's plays in school. Some, I have re-read more than others over the years. Now, reading all of his work at once again so many decades later, I found I did not read alone. I was turning the pages and reading the words with my aging eyes, but there beside me was the same preteen who marveled at Julius Caesar's tale with such impression. I read it with different eyes now, but the same awe is there. It is a great work. I read this from a huge hardback leather edition that is in chronological order, instead of the usual division between folios. I liked it better this way, and still yet, I find I liked the comedies the least.

I found that Amazon Prime has a variety of Shakespeare streaming productions available, most for free. They are faithful to the written script. Some are even recorded on a live stage. The two that I recommend most are The Macbeth with Patrick Stewart, even though it is sandwiched into a 'Hitler-like' scenario; and the production of Pericles, which is visually fascinating. Oh... the Julius Caesar is a must watch as well!

Here are the links and quotes I mentioned:
BBC Shakespeare Julius Caesar
Macbeth
Pericles

"I'd rather keep that which I have than coveting for more, be cast from possibility of all." -King Richard VI

"A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse!" - King Richard III

"We owe God a death." - King Henry IV

"The truth you speak doth lack some gentleness And time to speak it in. You rub the sore when you should bring the plaster." - The Tempest

"I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips, straining upon the start. The games' afoot: Follow your spirit;" -Henry V

"We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;" -Henry V

"I wasted time, and now doth time waste me;" -Richard II

"The undiscover'd country, from whose bourn no traveler returns," - Hamlet, Prince of Denmark

"If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?" -Shylock the Jew in The Merchant of Venice

"Why man, he doth bestride the narrow world Like a Colossus; and we petty men Walk under his huge legs, and peep about To find ourselves dishonourable graves. Men at some time are masters of their fates" -Cassius to Brutus in Julius Caesar

"There is a world elsewhere." -Coriolanus

"If there be fire before me, must I straightway run to burn myself?" Marina in Pericles

"Who worse than a physician would this report become? But I consider by medicine life may be prolong'd, Yet death will seize the doctor too." -Cymbeline

"Ill deeds is doubled with an evil word." - Luciana in The Comedy of Errors

"These earthy godfathers of heaven's lights, that give a name to every fixed star, have no more profit of their shining nights Than those that walk and wot not what they are. Too much to know, is to know naught but fame; and every godfather can give a name." Love's Labours' Lost

"Everyone can master a grief but he that has it." -Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing

"Sweet are the uses of adversity, which like the toad, ugly and venomous, wears yet a precious jewel in his head." - As you Like It

"Shame to him whose cruel striking kills for faults of his own liking! Twice treble shame on Angelo, To weed my vice and let his grow!" - Measure for Measure

"A lady's verily is as potent as a lord's." -Hermione in The Winter's Tale

"It is an heretic that makes the fire, Not she which burns in't." -Paulina in The Winter's Tale

"The game is up!" - Cymbeline

"Now my old arms are young John Talbot's grave." - Old Talbot in King Henry VI

"Superfluity come sooner by white hairs, but competency lives longer." - The Merchant of Venice

"To be or not to be, that is the question." - Hamlet

"Doubt thou the stars are fire; Doubt that the sun doth move; Doubt truth to be a liar; But never doubt I love." - Hamlet

Objectively, this is good. I can’t rate it, though. Analyzing Shakespeare under grading criteria made my brain hurt. God rest his soul. Amen. Praised be. After all the loans you’d think the frame for my degree would be free, but yanno

W/ today's reading of "A&Cleopatra", I will no longer be able to read a Shakespearean play for the first time . Anyways, the worst of the lot: "Taming", "King John", "Titus" and "Two Gentlemen". The best: "Midsummer Night's Dream", "Macbeth", "Lear", "Richard II", "Richard III" and (of course) "Hamlet". Unexpectedly good: "Henry V", "Henry VI Part 1", "Othello", "12th Night", "Henry IV Parts 1&2".

People always complain that the language is hard to read but, while it is easier to watch than read his works, the effort is worth the reward. The poetry and craftmanship of his words are magical. So emotive. He somehow speaks straight to the soul. Who else would be remembered so fondly after so long a time?

This is NOT The Riverside Shakespeare, Second Edition

The Riverside Shakespeare, Second Edition was published in hardback in 1997. The first edition was published in 1974. This electronic version contains nothing but the texts of the plays from the first edition. The title page of this electronic version states, "based on the 1974 Riverside Edition." When I took a course on Shakespeare in my second year of undergrad studies in 1 985, we used the original first edition (I do not know which printing of the first edition we used. About a year ago I bought the first edition in hard copy, used and in good condition (sixth printing, with corrections and additions) for only $4.00 because all of my books were destroyed in an apartment fire in early 1986. The pages of the first edition are 10 inches tall and nearly eight inches wide, with thin (but not extremely thin) paper. It is 1,923 pages long and contains a 26 page general introduction, followed by an 18 page section titled Shakespeare's Text. That section begins with several quotes of text familiar to Shakespeare readers, such as "[m]ost readers know that MacBeth, reproached by Lady MacBeth for seeming cowardice, asserts, 'I dare doo all that may become a man; / Who dares do more is none,'" and other such examples. After four more examples, the essay states': " What most readers are not aware of, however, is that none of these familiar lines appeared in the original, basic texts in exactly the same form here quoted; in fact, each contains one or more amended words designed to restore meaning to an otherwise corrupt passage. " This section of the first edition is followed by a chronology of texts and sources. Each play has an introduction of its own introduction. The first full-length page of The Comedy of Errors contains 39 footnotes making it possible to understand the text (e.g., "making amain" means "proceeding at full speed"; "gave healthful advice" means advice saving the lives of shipwracl'd guests, etc.).
The second edition 2,057 pages long, with additional information. It is available used in good or very good condition on Amazon and through other outlets for a mere $10.00. I could not possibly understand what I am reading without those notes and all of the other helpful information, all of which is missing from this electronic version falsely advertised as the second edition.

I listed the plays individually on Goodread in order to write my responses to each one. This volume stands for Shakespeare's sonnets and poems.

And what is to be said? He's brilliant. That's all.

Would I read all the works again? Only a few sonnets. I have a "never again" list of plays. But I plan to keep reading my favorites.

This edition is frill-free. No introductions, no illustrations, no footnotes, no gloss. I liked that. It was good to come to the bard with my wits, such as they are, and a dictionary if needed. The text is in two columns and sometimes overflows with a [bracket on the line above.

For this project, I listened to the excellent Arkangel recordings as I read. It spoiled me; for the few works where no recordings were available, I scrounged up a Librivox audio. In the other direction, the few times I listened to a play in the car without the text, I went back and read/listened.

Someone (http://www.shicho.net/38/stats/38word...) assembled a word count for the plays: 928,913. Good words. Funny words. Grievous words. Meh words. Double entendres. Uplifting words. Beautiful words.

This project, now completed, has been a benediction.