A sensible approach for lovers of literature and also for you writers
One of the endless gifts of teaching, and there are many, is that you learn your subject matter very well. For a few years I was teaching Romeo and Juliet to five classes a day. I taught Hamlet for years in AP English, and Taming of the Shrew, Twelfth Night, the sonnets, and Othello in my Shakespeare elective. Over my 28-year-career at Big Spring High School, I had the luxury of reading and rereading Shakespeare, and the great benefit of discussing and rediscussing Shakespeare with my classes and the members of Shakespeare Troupe.
I was also lucky enough to have Mrs. Sue Hench at Carlisle High School as a kind of a mentor. She could not get enough of Shakespeare and remains so today. For a time, I felt the same way. I read Harold Bloom, Helen Vendler, and Stephen Greenblatt.
However, even other English teachers said, “That’s too much Shakespeare for me.” He’s hard to read. He alludes to things hundreds of years old, or, with Roman and Greek literature, thousands of years old. On top of everything, he is, as one critic put it, an uneven writer. No one would put Timon of Athens (read it) on the same level as Hamlet. And what does one do with Titus Andronicus (read it, tried to direct scenes from it, failed)?
Before you Bardophiles berate me, let me reiterate that I write these suggestions not for scholars, who should be reading all of Shakespeare, but for those who love literature and for those who write. The best Shakespeare contains a multitude of philosophical conundrums and stylish dramatics that well serve readers patient enough to study him, both philosophically and creatively.
Cutting to the chase: Here are the plays that you may read and reread the rest of your life and never exhaust the genius within.
Hamlet King Lear
Othello Romeo and Juliet
The Sonnets A Midsummer Night’s Dream
The Merchant of Venice Henry V
Yes. I’m leaving out 30 plays. I’m leaving out Hamlet’s evil twin ever present in senior year English classes, Macbeth, and its “It is a tale told by an idiot” soliloquy. Without it, how would Faulkner have written that masterpiece, The Sound and the Fury? I include only one comedy and one history. Sorry, but the other 30 don’t have the unending fountain of brilliance seen in my picks.
Any of you readers out there who would like a defense of any of these elite eight, send me your request and I will gladly post my justification.
As an enticement to get you reading, savor a relatively obscure quote from each play, each emblem profound and artfully rendered. When’s the last time you read such deep ideas rendered so beautifully?
Hamlet
Hamlet: “O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams”.
Othello
Othello: "But he that filches from me my good name
Robs me of that which not enriches him,
And makes me poor indeed".
The Sonnets
Therefore I lie with her and she with me,
And in our faults by lies we flattered be.
The Merchant of Venice
Shylock: “He hath disgrac’d me and hind’red me half a million; laugh’d at my losses, mock’d at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated my enemies. And what’s his reason? I am a Jew.”
King Lear
King Lear: “You think I’ll weep?
No, I’ll not weep. Storm and tempest.
I have full cause of weeping, but this heart
Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws,
Or e’re I’ll weep.—O Fool, I shall go mad.”
Romeo and Juliet
Romeo: “Love is a smoke made with the fume of sighs;
Being purg'd, a fire sparkling in lovers' eyes;
Being vex'd, a sea nourish'd with lovers' tears;
What is it else? A madness most discreet,
A choking gall, and a preserving sweet.”
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Helena: “So we grew together,
Like to a double cherry, seeming parted,
But yet an union in partition,
Two lovely berries moulded on one stem.”
Henry V
Chorus: “O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend
The brightest heaven of invention,
A kingdom for a stage, princes to act
And monarchs to behold the swelling scene!”
Read and reread these 8 plays. You’ll gain a certain mastery over them; though, the more you read them, the more you’ll see. You will never be quite done with them. But the thoughts and manner of expression will last you a lifetime.