Everyone knows at least one line of Shakespeare. At least once in your life, you've heard "To be or not to be," "Wherefore art thou Romeo?" or "All the world's a stage." Stereotypical or not, the Bard of Stratford upon Avon has been part of our lives from the very beginning. Unfortunately, many people do not share the immense love of Shakespeare that I contain, and that is a simple and shallow mistake.
The first Shakespeare play that I remember seeing was "As You Like It," one of Shakespeare's most famous comedies, in 2007. While I don't remember everything about the show, I remember being floored by the language and the way that the actors handled such complex vocabulary. While hard to understand, the emotions and actions of the characters were perfectly conveyed through the actors' careful choices.
I have seen at least two Shakespeare shows every summer at the Great River Shakespeare Festival, a phenomenal and downright lovely company that arrives in Winona, MN during the vernal months. Each July, I excitedly pack my bags to take part in Shakespeare for Young Actors, a three week long intensive workshop that immerses teens in the art of studying Shakespeare. Those 21 days are filled with inside jokes shared with lifelong friends, diving into deep text analysis of profound verse, and studying under the most talented, kind people you will ever have the fortune to meet.
Throughout the past five years that I have done immersive Shakespeare, and the years in elementary school that I haphazardly acted in scenes, it is always made apparent to me that the world we live in has been shaped by Shakespeare's words. Almost every common phrase has originated in one of his works: "break the ice," "catch a cold," "dead as a doornail," "for goodness' sake," and "heart of gold," just to name a few. Our language, though constantly changing and evolving, undoubtedly shows that the Bard's genius has been influencing us for hundreds of years.
Despite the obvious fact that Shakespeare affects our language and way of writing, many people find themselves with a blatant dislike or disregard for Shakespeare and the fashion of his speech. When reading "Romeo and Juliet" in my Introduction to Literature class during freshman year, my classmates were unexcited, unwilling, and unable to comprehend the text in front of them. Two people fall in love, their families hate each other, and eventually they kill themselves. That's all, right? They didn't see the ways in which the adolescent boys truly suffer when their lives begin to unravel. They didn't catch the double entendres and word play that Shakespeare so cleverly weaves into the dialogue. They didn't bother to dive beyond the shallow surface of their English class.
The ways in which Shakespeare is taught in the schools hardly garners praise from those who truly love the language. In elementary school I found myself plainly stating my lines, never quite knowing what was being said or why I was saying it. A major part of the Shakespeare for Young Actors program is delving deep into the text to paraphrase your lines into modern English, through the use of Shakespeare lexicons; These monumental books show the specific definition for each word you might require, along with every time that word is used. This vital practice allows each actor to know precisely what they're saying, why they're saying it, and every hidden meaning buried in the line. By doing so, actors learn to love the Bard's language even more, and can understand the importance of these plays even in modern times.
Our teacher had us pen an essay on whether or not Shakespeare was still relevant in modern times. The answer seemed to be a no-brainer to me, but a myriad of classmates stated that he was irrelevant and outdated. I implore everyone to look around them and to understand that William Shakespeare has weaved himself into the fabric of our world's being. To understand that iambic pentameter, the rhythm in which Shakespeare wrote, sounds like a heart beat when the text is scanned. To realize how many words and phrases that you say daily that would not exist without him. Our world was turned upside down by a British play-write.
When asked to think of a quote that describes me, I always come up with "And though she be but little, she is fierce." My life has been truly enriched by Shakespeare's words, and I only hope that my elders, peers, and future generations all will realize just how different the world would be without his remarkable plays and sonnets.
