| Author |
 Topic Search  Topic Options
|
Sean Trane 
Special Collaborator
Prog Folk
Joined: April 29 2004
Location: Heart of Europe
Status: Offline
Points: 20386
|
 Topic: Shaw v Shakespear
Posted: September 27 2006 at 04:20 |
 Ghost Rider wrote:
BTW, I voted for Shakespeare, who is one of my all-time favourite writers. I also like Shaw quite a lot, but I feel there's no real comparison between the two.
|
Thanks for confirming that. I was not that familiar with Shaw's works, but it seemed an odd match-up.
Shakespeare can be compared with the French trilogy of Moliere, Corneille and Racine.
But duelling Shaw and Shakespeare is like comparing Goya and Dali.
|
|
let's just stay above the moral melee
prefer the sink to the gutter
keep our sand-castle virtues
content to be a doer
as well as a thinker,
prefer lifting our pen
rather than un-sheath our sword
|
 |
mystic fred
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: March 13 2006
Location: Londinium
Status: Offline
Points: 4252
|
Posted: September 26 2006 at 16:52 |
condor wrote:
In my opinion, the two most important playrights by a long stretch. Who's better? Also, for those in Britain (I don't know about abroad), is forcing children to learn Shakespear a form of cultural authoritarianis?. |
Shakespeare can be enjoyed by children, though i never really appreciated him till years later, his sense of humour is amazing, and today we quote from Shakespeare more than we realise (what the dickens? give me some elbow room, for goodness sake, in my heart of hearts a fool's paradise is a foregone conclusion - there's the rub!) - cultural authoritarianism in schools? it was all Greek to me - i would say so, yes!! 
Edited by mystic fred - September 26 2006 at 17:00
|
 Prog Archives Tour Van 
|
|
Jared
Forum Senior Member
Joined: May 06 2005
Location: Hereford, UK
Status: Offline
Points: 20162
|
Posted: September 25 2006 at 12:35 |
|
Having studied both (R III, Measure for Measure & The Tempest on the one hand, Devil's Disciple, Arms & The Man & Mrs Warren's Profession on the other), Shakespeare wins in my book...
|
|
Music has always been a matter of energy to me. On some nights I believe that a car with the needle on empty can run 50 more miles if you have the right music very loud on the radio. Hunter S Thompson
|
|
sleeper
Prog Reviewer
Joined: October 09 2005
Location: Entropia
Status: Offline
Points: 16449
|
Posted: September 21 2006 at 20:59 |
condor wrote:
In my opinion, the two most important playrights by a long stretch. Who's better? Also, for those in Britain (I don't know about abroad), is forcing children to learn Shakespear a form of cultural authoritarianis?. |
Its only a few years since I was tougt Shakey so I think I can give this one a go. The experiance was bloody awful! We had to dissect several sections of Macbeth into such away that all fun that may have been had from the play was eliminated with ruthless efficiancy. I absolutely hated it and as a result I haveabsolutely no drive to go and disscover what else he has done, though I suspect that I might like a fair bit of his work I just remember how much I hated being force fed Macbeth. Mybe if schools got students to read the plays and then discuss the effects he as had on the English language, rather than dissecting indavidual sections of plays to find out why he gave charecters 1 word sentences (  ), a lot more kids/teenagers would be interested in discovering him further.
Edited by sleeper - September 21 2006 at 20:59
|
Spending more than I should on Prog since 2005
|
|
KoS
Forum Senior Member
Joined: May 17 2005
Location: Los Angeles
Status: Offline
Points: 16310
|
Posted: September 21 2006 at 18:12 |
|
Shakespeare, ever since I had to remember Hamlet's soliloquy in the seventh grade.
I haven't read much of Shaw but I still feel that Shakespeare was the master.
Edited by king of Siam - September 21 2006 at 18:13
|
|
Syzygy
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: December 16 2004
Location: United Kingdom
Status: Offline
Points: 7003
|
Posted: September 21 2006 at 16:46 |
I don't know that there's a valid point of comparison here. Shaw was both a tremendous admirer of Shakespeare and an outspoken critic, although more of poor interpretations of the Bard's work than the plays themselves. Shaw is not so widely performed now, but neither was Shakespeare half a century or so after his death. I believe that plays like Arms and the Man or Man and Superman will enjoy a revival in years to come, and that possibly in the 23rd century he will be held in even higher esteem than Shakespeare is today.
As for the implications of teaching Shakespeare; it's not so much whether he's taught as how he's taught. Whatever your agenda, you can probably find something in the complete works that's apposite. Shakespeare's vision encompassed all manner of characters - remember that when you cite 'Neither a borrower nor a lender be' that it was uttered by Polonius, a doddering old fool whose advice to Hamlet is invariably either innappropriate or wrong. Just because Shakespeare put words into the mouths of his characters it doesn't lend them moral authority, as anybody trying to unpick characters like Othello or Shylock from a PC perspective finds out pretty quickly.
|
|
'Like so many of you
I've got my doubts about how much to contribute
to the already rich among us...'
Robert Wyatt, Gloria Gloom
|
|
Raff
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: July 29 2005
Location: None
Status: Offline
Points: 24429
|
Posted: September 21 2006 at 16:43 |
BaldJean wrote:
Marlowe was very important too and might have rivaled Shakespeare, had
his life not been so very short (he was murdered under mysterious
circumstances at age 29). his version of "Faust" even influenced Goethe. and how about Beckett?
and of course there are important playwrights in other languages than
English. Goethe, Schiller and Lessing in German, for example, also
Büchner (after whom the most important German literary prize is named).
Calderon in Spain. Dante Alighieri and Goldoni in Italy, also Dario Fo.
some ancient Greeks, like Sophokles or Euripides. Moliere, Sartre and
Camus in France. and that's just naming a few
|
I'm sorry to have to contradict you, Jean, but Dante Alighieri never wrote any plays. He was a poet and a critic, and in any case theatre in Italy (as in the rest of Europe) developed much later than Dante's time. As to other Italian playwrights, i think the best-known abroad is Pirandello. BTW, I voted for Shakespeare, who is one of my all-time favourite writers. I also like Shaw quite a lot, but I feel there's no real comparison between the two.
Edited by Ghost Rider - September 21 2006 at 16:47
|
|
tuxon
Forum Senior Member
Joined: September 21 2004
Location: plugged-in
Status: Offline
Points: 5502
|
Posted: September 21 2006 at 16:31 |
I am constant as the northern star, Of whose true-fix'd and resting quality There is no fellow in the firmament
nice quote from Shakespeare's play Julius Ceasar.
I wonder if Shake knew that the Pole star isn't a fixed star, but every now and than, another star is the north star.
If Shakespeare knew this, than it makes him more brilliant.
any way Shakespeare it is for me too.
You just got to love West End Story.
|
|
I'm always almost unlucky _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ Id5ZcnjXSZaSMFMC Id5LM2q2jfqz3YxT
|
|
Jim Garten
Special Collaborator
Retired Admin & Razor Guru
Joined: February 02 2004
Location: South England
Status: Offline
Points: 14693
|
Posted: September 21 2006 at 16:03 |
I was extremely lucky at school to have an English Literature master who was extremely vocal in his love for Shakespeare & his love of the subject was (to use an over-used expression) inspirational. Through him, and from the age of 13 I grew to love the romances, the histories, the tragedies (especially the tragedies - Titus Andronicus... now that's what I call parenting skills  ). I also feel that appreciation of Shakespeare led to my love of grand opera too, as so many of them were based either directly on the plays, or certainly featured similar grandiose themes.
In short - Shakey's the man for me
"whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, when verily one can't be arsed to get out of thine bed on the morrow"
|
Jon Lord 1941 - 2012
|
|
Peter
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: January 31 2004
Location: Canada
Status: Offline
Points: 9669
|
Posted: September 21 2006 at 15:52 |
condor wrote:
In my opinion, the two most important playrights by a long stretch. Who's better? Also, for those in Britain (I don't know about abroad), is forcing children to learn Shakespear a form of cultural authoritarianis?. |
No more so than forcing them to learn anything else which originated in one culture or country.
(And Shakespeare has universal appeal and relevance -- people from all over the world can relate to his characters and themes.)
I think there's a danger in forcing Shakespeare on kids who are simply too young for it, though.
I didn't encounter the Bard until university (I went back at 30), and by then, having lived a lot of life, and having a more mature/receptive attitude toward education and the acknowledged "greats" of the canon, I was ready to enjoy his writing.
His knowledge of human nature and motivation -- indeed the richness of the whole human experience -- was (and arguably still is) unsurpassed.
He's VERY important to Western literature, culture and even our language -- Shakespeare is taught, and held in such high regard, for very good reasons.
I love going to watch a Shakespeare play.
Shaw, believe it or not, I've never seen performed. I think I might have read some in university (in getting an English Specialist's degree), but I don't recall any. (I know he's a very important playwright, but that must say something about this stature in relation to Shakespeare.)
Long live the immortal Bard!
Edited by Peter Rideout - September 21 2006 at 15:56
|
|
"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
He chortled in his joy.
|
|
yesfan88
Forum Senior Member
Joined: August 24 2006
Location: United States
Status: Offline
Points: 357
|
Posted: September 20 2006 at 20:55 |
|
Shakespeare is more widely known and influential; everyone has to read him in school.
|
|
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"- Evelyn Beatrice Hall
|
|
BaldJean
Prog Reviewer
Joined: May 28 2005
Location: Germany
Status: Offline
Points: 10387
|
Posted: August 07 2006 at 15:42 |
|
Marlowe was very important too and might have rivaled Shakespeare, had
his life not been so very short (he was murdered under mysterious
circumstances at age 29). his version of "Faust" even influenced Goethe. and how about Beckett?
and of course there are important playwrights in other languages than
English. Goethe, Schiller and Lessing in German, for example, also
Büchner (after whom the most important German literary prize is named).
Calderon in Spain. Dante Alighieri and Goldoni in Italy, also Dario Fo.
some ancient Greeks, like Sophokles or Euripides. Moliere, Sartre and
Camus in France. and that's just naming a few
Edited by BaldJean - August 07 2006 at 16:03
|
 A shot of me as High Priestess of Gaia during our fall festival. Ceterum censeo principiis obsta
|
|
condor
Forum Senior Member
Joined: May 24 2005
Location: Norwich
Status: Offline
Points: 1069
|
Posted: August 07 2006 at 15:16 |
|
In my opinion, the two most important playrights by a long stretch. Who's better? Also, for those in Britain (I don't know about abroad), is forcing children to learn Shakespear a form of cultural authoritarianis?.
|
|
Donate monthly and keep PA fast-loading and ad-free forever.
/PAlogo_v2.gif "Progarchives.com Homepage")
Shaw v Shakespear
