Shakespeare

Heather, I know EXACTLY how you feel! I used to love the Shakespeare story adaptations when I was young, but when I hit high school, we had to sit endlessly at our desks, laboriously intoning line after line while stopping for every word we didn’t know, looking it up, writing the definition . . . AAAAH! It was horrible! I decided I hated Shakespeare.

Then I had a friend really encourage me to try a play when we started AO. So . . . I did, thinking all the time we were going to hate it. I determined to read for general meaning and not stop for every word. We started with an adaptation from my old friend, Lamb’s Tales from Shakespeare, and we were off. I knew we’d suffer through it.

Well, guess what? We LOVED it! We had a ball, zipping around the room, having fun. So we tried another. And went to see a professional troupe perform a play while we were on vacation. It was phenomenal, and everyone down to the 6yo said it was their favorite thing on the entire vacation. (DO check appriopriateness for children of anything you see in person or on video–some modern performers really delight in playing up all the bawdy parts)

So, now we love Shakespeare and do a play every year (there are some plays that just aren’t worth it to do with children) Why do this, though? I can think of a number of reasons, but none of them so compelling as to make you a bad mommy if you still decide against it.

1) Language. Shakespeare’s language use was amazing. It is just beautiful. We never get tired of hearing it. We memorize parts of it. It just sings in spots! Children exposed to Shakespeare will never be afraid of difficult language in other places–like the King James version of the Bible, the Federalist Papers, Francis Bacon—piece of cake! They will, in a sense, have an ear trained to extraordinary beauty in language.

2) The stories are so much a part of Western culture that you are really at a loss to understand so many allusions if you never do any Shakespeare. What does “a pound of flesh” mean? Which modern movies are in a way just a rehash of Romeo and Juliet? What does “something rotten in Denmark” mean? If you want to know–read Shakespeare. 🙂 Those who do not know these things will be hampered to an extent in educated company.

3) The character stuff in Shakespeare is pretty subtle. We’re not talking a “Millers” book here, with the moral plain to be seen. But the worldview embedded in Shakespeare is one in which actions have consequences. Lady Macbeth does not get off scot-free. Shakespeare takes a laser light to the human soul and sometimes what he finds is pretty unsavory–but IMO we are the better if we learn it. IMO the main character lessons to be learned can best be learned by older students–at least 12 and up. We don’t mess with this stuff with younger children in my home. We read the fun stuff. 🙂 Also, there are plays that are pretty bawdy. We just do not see a need to do those ones at all.

So. We love having Shakespeare part of our home. Before you decide, I do wish you’d perhaps get an adaptation of some plays and read that yourself. I would recommend Tales from Shakespeare by Charles and Mary Lamb, Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare by Edith Nesbit, or the ones by James Garfield, cannot remember the name. I also have a few references in my home, like Shakespeare for Dummies, that I’ve found helpful. Many of these ought to be in your library for a “test drive”

Please remember that you do not have to do everything at once! I cannot remember the ages of all of your children, but I seem to think they are still pretty young? IMO ALL you need for grades maybe 2nd through 4th or 5th is to read two or three of these adaptation stories a year. That’s it. That’s not so bad! Then, when you have a couple of children in 4th or 5th grades and up, try warming up with an adaptation story and then trying a play a year. It IS do-able. A resource that can be very good is Jim Erskine’s Shakespeare package. We have this, and it has old radio adaptations of several plays, several files of helpful information, and an audio reading of Nesbit’s Beautiful Stores from Shakespeare. With coloring pages! So all you’d need to do is pop the CD in the stereo, listen to a story and color a picture. Easy! You can find this here:

http://www.letticebell.com/Shakespeare/

As a bonus, there are even more reasons to consider Shakespeare studies on this page!

Like I said, you won’t be a bad mommy if you decide against this. I’m just trying to help you look at it from another viewpoint. Don’t forget, after you’ve explored and thought, to ask your Father what He thinks.

Michelle D

We really like Lamb’s. I would start there and get a taste of Shakespeare so you can in turn fall in love with Shakespeare.