Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown

I am fa-reeking OUT.

I just learned on frog-Zeba's blog that BBC has made a new adaptation of Shakespeare's "mini series" -- Richard II, Henry IV Part I, Henry IV Part II, and Henry V. I have an older version they made, and this one looks amaaazing!

 

Scene from the old one, An Age of Kings...

 

My lurv affair with this started when I saw Kenneth Branagh's Henry V in the theatre.

 

I watch it over and over. I got the idea to write a comedic modernisation--of Paris Hilton type fool who inherits her parent's company and turns out not to be an idiot. So then I started studying the three previous plays, to see how far back I wanted to start the story, and to figure out back story. They're actually better plays than Henry V, which is sort of pro-war pro-England propaganda. Orson Welles made a great adaptation of the Henry IVs called Chimes at Midnight.

 

I've worked out a fair amount of that book's characters and plot. It will probably include pirates. Many of the characters (Hal, Falstaff) are now women. When I'm done with my current book, that's the one I'm vair excited to write.

Seasons such as these: Lear is still pretty frickin' relevant

I love Shakespeare. My beloved grandfather taught English Literature and specialized in Shakespeare and Chaucer, so I grew up associating them with him--if he loved them, they must be good. I collected cheap paperbacks of the plays, or sat in the library reading them from big heavy tomes until my parents bought me a big brick that contained all the plays. I took out videos and records from the library--I have fond memories of sitting against my bunk bed, headphones on, lost in one Shakespeare record or another.

King Lear was my favorite tragedy, maybe because I was taken to see Akira Kurosawa's Ran at age 12 and was mesmerized by it.*

Right now my dad and I are watching one of my fave series: Slings and Arrows (2003-07). It's a dramedy about a Shakespeare festival and all the shenanigans going on behind the scenes, starring a mix of comedians and stage alumni. We've begun season three where the cast is putting on King Lear.

For those who might not know the story, it's about a vain King who drives away the people who truly care for him, and then is betrayed by the whack jobs he put his faith in. He's eventually thrown out, poor, into a terrible storm that reflects his mental state.

If you have a 1:41 minutes, watch this short scene where the old actor playing Lear describes the storm, and Lear's sudden insight:

Being a tragedy, this sudden insight comes too late. But what a beautiful speech! Gives me les shivers. Especially in this time of arrogant Wall Street execs, and people losing their jobs and being foreclosed on. It still resonates. And on a metaphorical level too--it made me think of the people I know who are weathering personal storms.

Poor naked wretches, whereso'er you are,
That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm,
How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides,
Your loop'd and window'd raggedness, defend you
From seasons such as these? O, I have ta'en
Too little care of this! Take physic, pomp;
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
That thou mayst shake the superflux to them,
And show the heavens more just.

Modern translation from the No Fear series: Poor homeless creatures suffering this storm, wherever you are, how will you survive a night like this with no roof over your heads, no fat on your sides to keep you warm, and only rags for clothes? When I was king I didn’t do enough to help you. Powerful men, take your medicine by learning about hardship. Go out and feel what the impoverished feel. Then you can give them your extra wealth and make the world more fair.

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* Other takes on Lear: Has anyone read Moore's Fool? Is it good? Smiley's Thousand Acres is supposed to be good, but I've only watched the movie, one night in passing, on TV. It got abysmal reviews but I stayed with it.

After brokenness - mercy

I posted awhile back someone else's essay about the state of being broken and how it's a positive thing. And my dad replied on his blog with an example of a time when he felt broken.

The state of brokenness might help us see flaws in our own thinking or acting or way of being. Author and writing teacher Lucy March talks about towering*, from the tarot card where you see a tower being destroyed, usually by lightning. 

Maybe a flash of insight that makes you realize (in the language of memes) ...

"Life: You're doing it wrong."

But I don't believe in letting the tower fall on you. Guilt and remorse are useful emotions for a time, but they shouldn't crush us. 

One of my dad's favorite passages from Shakespeare is the whole "quality of mercy is not strained" speec which is indeed beautiful, but it's about showing mercy toward other people. Leonard Cohen's "Sisters of Mercy" is a good compliment to it because it's a reminder that mercy is available to us as well. A lot of tarots show greenery outside of the tower--mercy as "graceful and green as a stem"?

So this is my song-reply to my dad's reply. 

Pick the version you think you'll like best, cause I love them all.

It's obviously touched many artists.

Oh the sisters of mercy, they are not departed or gone.

They were waiting for me when I thought that I just can't go on.

And they brought me their comfort and later they brought me their song.

Oh I hope you run into them, you who've been travelling so long.

Yes you who must leave everything that you cannot control.

It begins with your family, but soon it comes around to your soul.

Well I've been where you're hanging, I think I can see how you're pinned:

When you're not feeling holy, your loneliness says that you've sinned.

They lay down beside me, I made my confession to them.

They touched both my eyes and I touched the dew on their hem.

If your life is a leaf that the seasons tear off and condemn

they will bind you with love that is graceful and green as a stem.

When I left they were sleeping, I hope you run into them soon.

Don't turn on the lights, you can read their address by the moon.

And you won't make me jealous if I hear that they sweetened your night:

We weren't lovers like that and besides it would still be all right,

We weren't lovers like that and besides it would still be all right.

Serena Ryder

Emmylou Harris and Linda Ronstadt

Original Leonard 

Leonard Cohen with the sisters of mercy backing him up  

Sting and the Chieftains

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* Lucy March has just re-released an older book in ebook form--the very book she talks about in her post on towering. I haven't read it yet! But you should buy it too cause it's just $3. :-)  "When I wrote The Fortune Quilt, my writing goal for the book was to tell a story about someone whose life had completely fallen apart. Like the beginning of a country western song, the book would start with her losing everything she held dear – family, friends, and career – and would chronicle how she rebuilt her life from there. In the book, the main character, Carly, ends up in a community of psychics and artists, where she is then told that this horrible experience she has had, her entire life falling apart, is a universal experience, and it is called ‘Being Towered.’"

                  

Merry Rewriting Shakespeare = Genius

Merry (one of the Betties) needs to rewrite ALL of Shakespeare! This (see below) is apparently what comes of commuting with Shakespeare's collected works. From her blog post here.

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Instead of a measly epilogue at the end of All's Well that Ends Well, we should have a version of Whack-a-Mole. The "hero" of the play would play the part of the mole, and all the other characters would take turns hitting him. Much more satisfying ending.

The Comedy of Errors is the Elizabethan equivalent of a cheap sitcom featuring two sets of identical twins "with hilarious results." I suggest it be re-written as a one-man play. Watching one poor actor trying to portray all those identical twins without going mad would be entertaining, in a twisted kind of way.

Titus Andronicus is Shakespeare's version of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Seems to me the least Will could've done was throw in an actual chainsaw and a Texan or two.