h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

S9 said, on the topic of Shakespeare: "He is considered to be one of the greats, because that is what he is : GREAT. Gigantic. And only apathy and a bad education could lead you to think otherwise."

And then said:"I can't see any dramatic flaws in anything Shakespeare wrote."

Perhaps it is *you* who have the bad education. 20-minute soliloquys that cannot adequately justify their presence in the story are a huge dramatic faux-pas. And the comedies are worse than the tragedies... they display a crudity of humor that makes South Park look sophisticated by comparison.

blicky said: "Up until the last forty years or so many pop and music lyricists struggled with the same problem as shakespeare in that they felt that the market might not allow them to focus on wider issues hence in the 50's and early 60's most of the songs were mostly, pretty one dimensional love songs. Any references to sex had to be heavily veiled and most other subjects went almost totally ignored."

And now, today, we're inundated by one-dimensional love songs which refer to sex in explicit terms. It's not much of an improvement.

Also, Shakespeare's references to sex were not heavily veiled. See Midsummer Night's Dream.

Shakespeare didn't write stories.

He wrote plays.

VAST difference.

The presence of a soliliquy is in order to reveal the inner thoughts of a character to the audience. In a piece of writing, it is easier to convey interior dialogue. In a play, because it is all action, there is no other form of insight.

Me? Bad education? I think not.

You're right about the sex thing though. Shakespeare was an old perve. But then, so was his audience. Was that meant to be a negative aspect of his writing?

Look, Blathers, I'm going to ask a really simple question here.

If Shakespeare is so cr*p, how come he has put bums on seats for almost 400 years, just about continously? Across totally different cultures as well.

Or are you so bloody sure of yourself that you claim to be the only person in those 400 years to have not been brainwashed or whatever it is that allows you to spot his tawdry skills for what they are when 400 years of theatre and now cinema goers derive enormous entertainment and pleasure from his works?

My

The thing I have always loved about Shakespeare was that his drama and his comedy appealed to both the cheap seats and the expensive ones. Broad drama was interrupted by comedic action, usually quite coarse, to keep everyone interested. The large issues of state and church were dealt with, the crude sex drive of the locals was dealt with, the belly laugh was dealt with. Macbeth with Morgancrantz and Guildenstern, the characters of Falstaff, etc. Every one was an issue of the day (or historically embellished) with a touch of comedy, broad farce, and human development. He wrote like that to keep everyone in the crowd happy.

You know, earlier today I read something:

50 billion flies can't be wrong, let's all eat

So you join the idea that those of us who enjoy Shakespeare have somehow been brainwashed and are merely eating sh*t because it's what we've been taught to do?

Hilarious. Really, your arrogance and contempt for your fellow man must stand in good stead in your day to day life.

Britney Spears also puts butts in seats. Is she great?

Twain has a pretty good explanation why Shakespeare is considered great, and why he has put butts in seats for 400 years. This is a small excerpt from a chapter of his autobiography, "Is Shakespeare Dead?"

"Scattered here and there through the stacks of unpublished manuscript which constitute this formidable Autobiography and Diary of mine, certain chapters will in some distant future be found which deal with "Claimants"--claimants historically notorious: Satan, Claimant; the Golden Calf, Claimant; the Veiled Prophet of Khorassan, Claimant; Louis XVII., Claimant; William Shakespeare, Claimant; Arthur Orton, Claimant; Mary Baker G. Eddy, Claimant--and the rest of them. Eminent Claimants, successful Claimants, defeated Claimants, royal Claimants, pleb Claimants, showy Claimants, shabby Claimants, revered Claimants, despised Claimants, twinkle star-like here and there and yonder through the mists of history and legend and tradition--and, oh, all the darling tribe are clothed in mystery and romance, and we read about them with deep interest and discuss them with loving sympathy or with rancorous resentment, according to which side we hitch ourselves to. It has always been so with the human race. There was never a Claimant that couldn't get a hearing, nor one that couldn't accumulate a rapturous following, no matter how flimsy and apparently unauthentic his claim might be. Arthur Orton's claim that he was the lost Tichborne baronet come to life again was as flimsy as Mrs. Eddy's that she wrote SCIENCE AND HEALTH from the direct dictation of the Deity; yet in England nearly forty years ago Orton had a huge army of devotees and incorrigible adherents, many of whom remained stubbornly unconvinced after their fat god had been proven an impostor and jailed as a perjurer, and today Mrs. Eddy's following is not only immense, but is daily augmenting in numbers and enthusiasm. Orton had many fine and educated minds among his adherents, Mrs. Eddy has had the like among hers from the beginning. Her Church is as well equipped in those particulars as is any other Church. Claimants can always count upon a following, it doesn't matter who they are, nor what they claim, nor whether they come with documents or without. It was always so. Down out of the long- vanished past, across the abyss of the ages, if you listen, you can still hear the believing multitudes shouting for Perkin Warbeck and Lambert Simnel."

That's a good one.

Not only did he appeal to so many people, he appeals to different TYPES of people. Rich, poor, intelligent, thick, middle class, black, white, whatever.

There's no *way* you can get away with dismissing Shakespeare. You have every right to dislike him, but you can't sit there and justify it intelligently or insinuate we are stupid for disagreeing with you Blathers...

So by quoting Mark Twain, you therefore prove that you can't defend your own comments.

Blathers, thanks for that.

Britney Spears isn't great because she hasn't lasted for 400 years. Her career is incredibly short in comparison to Shakespeare. Perhaps if you picked on the obvious section of society that has lasted for 2000 years - Christianity - you might have a valid comparison.

Mark Twain, wasn't he that comedian that wrote such deep, timeless classics as *Huck Finn*?

Ok, so even Twain could get it wrong.

But basically you havbe to accept that your attitude is one of - 'You people who like Shakespeare are just reacting to a cultural thing. You don't really like him at all, you couldn't, because *I* can see he's cr*p, so he must be. Therefore you are much stupider than I am.'

Sorry, I enjoy Shakespeare. I find him fun and entertaining. His stories are interesting and characters alve. I refuse to accept that that makes me

a) cleverer than you because I have a degree in English Lit.

or

b) you cleverer than me because I habve not spotted the flaws in Shakespeare's work (Which i have anyway. No major artist is without flaws. Twain wrote 'Tom Saywer', for F*ck's sake).

What it means is you don't like Shakespeare and i do. Get of you high horse and try and get along with people, not judge them for their taste, low or high brow as it may be. They'll like you more.

Actually, I couldn't care less whether any of you like him or not. I'm reacting to S9's intellectual snobbery, which I quoted above ("only apathy and a bad education could lead you to think otherwise").

I don't like Shakespeare, but I don't judge people for what they do or don't like. So kindly get off your own high horse. I don't want to be liked by you if you're going to overreact in this manner. I would like to know what I've said to you that requires you to be personally insulting.

Incidentally, I believe that it is intellectual snobbery that has kept Shakespeare so popular over time. Because his language is complicated, it is fashionable to like him and to quote him often. Those who don't like him are perceived as being too simple to understand him.

And I've used neither of those arguments, nor said you should like Shakespare to prove yourself educated or anything else.

Different strokes for different folks. But in your way of saying you didn't like him it was implicit that you felt we (those of us that did) were culturally brain-washed fools for liking him.

I was simply stating my opinion. Everyone in this forum has their own. That you inferred such things from my posts says more about you than it does about me.

Maybe it does, but the inference is still there to be drawn from your posts, I'm afraid...

To your corners, gentlemen!

Can we agree to disagree and see all slights, real or imagined to be less than insulting?

More than happy too.

Gotta go get on with my project soon anyways...

lots of educated people dont like shakespeare...

No, I was merely pointing out that something being popular does not make it good. Don't take the metaphor too far or read too much into it. For a start me being arrogant would first require me to have something to be arrogant about...

Bouncy: I thought your flies post was a clever response to an ad populum fallacy, and did not deserve the abuse it received.