#grrrrr ive noticed it so many times i hate this

[theromaboo]

Step one: Search an ancient Roman in Google images.

Step two: Notice that the majority of images, even the ones at the top, are AI-generated.

Step three: Cry I dunno

[genderfluidfox]

Teaching Shakespeare

I always thought that Teaching Shakespeare is not as hard as it would seem. I had an incredibly well-read universally intelligent English teacher who was liked by almost everyone in class...and yet, he managed to fright every single student out of liking or even considering to like Shakespeare. I was put into the class already a Shakespeare nut, having played Hamlet in a theatre group and so on. In the end he and I were the only ones talking about Shakespeare in that class.

But I always wondered why he didn't enter the class on the first day and asked who had seen "The Lion King" or "The Lion King 2" or (aiming at Heath Ledger fangirls) "10 things I hate about you". A LOT of people would have seen these and then he could have revealed that therefore we already were quite familiar with 3 (major) Shakespeare plays. Instead he wrote Shakespeare's name on the board and asked what we knew about him and got the infamous answer "Didn't he write 'Moby Dick'?" by one of the clueless students. From then on everything went downhill.

We read "Much Ado" and I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHY ON EARTH HE DECIDED THAT WAS A GOOD IDEA (I even tried to talk him out of it)Young people, we were 16-18 years old. A comedy? Nobody cares about Comedies at that time. We've got other things on our mind. Love (Romeo and Juliet), struggle with our parents (Hamlet), jealousy (Othello, or he could even have had his comedy by reading Winter's Tale, though I find it a dreadfully random play), murdering our teachers (maybe) (Macbeth, which also happens to be the shortest one and therefore less frightening to the other students). The trouble with Comedies also is that the Groundling characters mostly gross us out, but the others are to damn witty, in that age and not yet used to his language you don't understand a word of what Benedick and Beatrice are saying.

Furthermore there are so many helping hands in modern entertainment. "Hollow Crown" selects modern stars and let's them play Shakespeare (which they do marvelously), no Laurence Olivier scaring students with his year of birth but Tom Hiddleston and Benedict Cumberbatch who are greatly loved by my generation. Or, if you ask me, the best and most seamless modernization of a play "My own private idaho" (Gus van Sant directed, Keanu Reeves and River Phoenix in the leading parts). It is the story of two gay hustlers (one of them being truly gay, the other just trying to piss off his rich father) mixed with, as you might have guessed, Henry IV. Part I. and II. I didn't know that the first time I saw it and hadn't yet read the Henries. There were certain moments when I just went "What was that? That was a bit weird. Characters don't usually talk about life and meaning while the other is passed out. Strange language for a second there as well" but then they went on with "Mickey, quit fucking around and get your ass over here" and you sort of forget the moment or save it under "Gus van Sant is one great director". Yet when I heard the story of Henry IV. for the first time I immediately thought "Wait a second! That's Idaho. It all makes sense". Why not show a scene about two hustlers talking to an elderly man, they have fooled the night before, and him trying to turn it into a heroic tale. Its literally Shakespeare text only that "rogues in buckram cloaks" becomes "punks in leather jackets" which is even staying true to the real idea. THE STUDENTS WOULDN'T EVEN NOTICE SHAKESPEARE, MOST DEFINITELY LIKE THE SCENE (because it's a great scene with fantastic writing) AND THEN WOULD REALIZE THAT THEY JUST LIKED THAT 400 YEARS DEAD POET THEY WERE SO AFRAID OF!

We didn't go to the theatre to actually see a play (which is good, because Hamlet was being played at the time ... the most terrible production I've ever seen) but we could have gone to the cinema and see the National Theatre Live or the RSC Livestreams. We only saw "Much Ado" by Kenneth Branagh, which is a fine movie, but which the students neither found funny nor relatable.

Grrrrr...yeah. I could go on for hours and hours....but I guess I'll leave it here otherwise I will be late for work.