Happy Birthday (and, errr, Death Day), William Shakespeare!

Today marks the day historians claim as the birth and death day of one of the greatest literary figures of all time--William Shakespeare. Born April 23, 1564 and said to have died on the same day in 1616, Shakespeare wrote over 150 sonnets, more than 35 plays, and other scribblings in his relatively short life.

I've always been a Shakespeare fan myself, memorizing my favorite sonnets before bed, reading play
aloud with friends (voices and all, it's true), and enjoying a live performance when I could find an affordable one. This past February, I even got the chance to visit Shakespeare's hometown of Stratford-upon-Avon, just outside of London, when in the UK with my boyfriend.

Downtown Stratford-upon-Avon

While I didn't get the opportunity to truly explore (yet), just being there and seeing the small mentions of Shakespeare throughout the town was an awesome experience. On the agenda for next time: Holy Trinity Church where Shakespeare is buried and his wife Anne Hathaway's house, among others sites.

In the meantime, I'll have to settle for what I can get from New Jersey to celebrate his birth/death day today--books, film adaptations, and even a package of Shakespeare-themed mints that I won during a study session for my Shakespeare final in college.

And, of course, these random fun facts I found on No Sweat Shakespeare:

• ‘William Shakespeare’ is an anagram of ‘I am a weakish speller’.  

• All Uranus’s satellites are named after Shakespearean characters.  

• Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway when he was 18. She was 26 and she was pregnant when they married. Their first child was born six months after the wedding. (Ooooh, scandal!)

• Shakespeare is the second most quoted writer in the English language – after the various writers of the Bible.

• Some of Shakespeare’s signatures have survived on original documents. In none of them does he spell his name in what has become the standard way. He spells it Shakespe; Shakspe; Shakspere and Shakespear. 

• Almost four hundred years after Shakespeare’s death there are 157 million pages referring to him on Google. There are 132 million for God, 2.7 million for Elvis Presley, and coming up on Shakespeare’s heels, George W Bush with 14.7 million. 

• Two of Shakespeare’s plays, Hamlet and Much Ado About Nothing, have been translated into Klingon. The Klingon Language Institute plans to translate more! (If you’re into quirky Shakespeare facts check our our  list of 23 things you never knew about Shakespeare)

 See the whole list of Shakespeare facts HERE

A Monday Morning Joss Whedon Distraction

Since I last posted, I have been to four different countries, moved to a new state with a totally different lifestyle, and begun a sloooow launch of my new editorial company, Double Vision Editorial. It has been overwhelming to say the least. So, let's just pretend my little disappearance never happened, shall we? :)

Instead, let's all enjoy this new trailer for the incredible Joss Whedon's upcoming adaptation of William Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing, posted last week on GalleyCat.

The Avengers director Joss Whedon adapted William Shakespeare‘s comedy, Much Ado About Nothing, as a modern-day retelling. The trailer is embedded above–what do you think? 

A limited release date has been set for June 07, 2013. The film has already screened at the Toronto International Film Festival and the Glasgow Film Festival. As we previously reported, Whedon shot the entire movie at his own home in 12 days. Here’s more about the film from NPR: 

As I watched Much Ado About Nothing, I had the distinct thought, “I wonder whether this is the future.” Not the future, of course — I don’t believe we’re anywhere close to the end of the blockbuster, nor do I believe we’re necessarily entering a new age of Shakespeare — but a big piece of the future. Big films have gotten so big, expensive films so expensive, that all of the risk has to be drained out of them, which often leaves behind a dried-out version of whatever was originally intended. 

See the original post HERE 

See? Now isnt't that a fun start to your week?

The Never-Ending Shakespeare Debate

William Shakespeare is one of the most written about playwrights of all time (duh), not only in terms of literary criticism but also in the realm of biographies. Shakespeare was born over 450 years ago and people are still trying to figure out the truth about him--whether he actually wrote his plays, what his role was in 16th-17th century society, and then the ever popular questions of his sexuality, religious beliefs, and what he looked like.

These are things that will will never actually be known, no matter how many people theorize about him. But that doesn't stop scholars from trying. Guardian.co.uk contributor Michael Caines wrote an interesting piece recently about the various Shakespeare biographies in print (and even touched about the bios that show themselves in films loosely based on the Bard):

Shakespeare has inspired a lot of wonky scholarship from his biographers - a source of much fun for the connoisseur of snobbery and ignorance.

James Shapiro's Contested Will concentrates on the lunatic fringe of Shakespeare authorship theories – a fascinating topic, to be sure, if you admire snobbery, philistinism and ignorance.

But as it happens, Shakespeare biography is now (at least) 300 years old, and there have been plenty of bemusing, eccentric or downright surreal contributions to the field, even among those biographers who don't think Shakespeare was the Earl of Oxford. Crackpot theorising, outright fantasising and expressions of superimposed vanity (Shakespeare, c'est moi!) are all part of the fun. Take the following examples, for example: attempts at writing the ultimate writer's life, good, bad, indifferent, ugly, or just plain delusional. Further suggestions/angry objections welcome.

According to [John] Aubrey's Brief Lives, that fine blend of antiquarian notes and 17th-century table talk, Shakespeare's father was a butcher. When he was a boy, "he exercised his father's trade, but when he killed a calf he would do it in a high style, and make a speech". Shakespeare was a schoolteacher for a while and taught Latin (no doubts there about Shakespeare's linguistic abilities). "His comedies will remain wit as long as the English tongue is understood."

The business of Shakespeare biography gets going with [Nocholas] Rowe, the poet laureate and playwright who (correct me if I'm wrong) gave the English language the word "Lothario". Rowe prefaced his 1709 edition of Shakespeare's Works with a short biography that was reissued last year to mark its 300th anniversary. Marvellously wide of the mark on most matters of fact, it's full of praise for the plays. Rowe sees Shylock in The Merchant of Venice as a serious rather than a buffoonish part, which is how it was acted at the time, and defends Shakespeare against general critical prejudices. The young Shakespeare was a deer-poacher. Getting caught led directly to his move – his escape – into the theatre business.

Read the rest of the article HERE
(and check out some of the interesting comments too)

Normally, I probably would've overlooked this article, to be perfectly honest. While I am certainly a Shakespeare fan (I own an amazing edition of his complete works that I love and once had a Shakespeare reading group--yes, we all had parts and read aloud, dorky but fun!), I don't generally read biographies so my eye naturally passes over them.

But this time, it caught me because I already had Shakespeare on the brain. My dear friend TS over at Must Love Books introduced me last night to a few hysterical YouTube videos called "Sassy Gay Friend" involving what would have happened to characters like Ophelia, Juliet, and Desdemona had each of the self-destructive ladies had a gay boyfriend to snap them out of their funks:

Hamlet

Othello

Romeo and Juliet