The True Value of Shakespeare

When I was a senior in high school my two best friends and I bought some really expensive cigars for our senior spring break ski trip.  I don't remember what brand they were or how much they cost, only that they were exponentially more expensive than our delicious Swisher Sweets.  However, once the cigars where lit after our first day of skiing, I noticed that all three of us were smacking our lips in disgust like we had just eaten some foul peanut butter. We looked at our confused at our mammoth man cigars.  We hacked through a few more puffs expecting to get to the more expensive and tasteful part.  This was expensive, it won some kind of award, we should like this. This should be good.  As Seinfeld once said, "This is like smoking a chicken bone."  Finally someone broke down and said what we were all thinking, "Screw it, let's go get some Swishers."  In the words of my friend and pre-marriage counselor, we finally stopped "shoulding" on ourselves and immediately made a run for the convenience store to salvage the evening.

I finished The Taming of the Shrew this weekend and I had a very similar experience as described above.  The following thoughts ran through my mind at various points,  "I should like this.  It's Shakespeare, it's classic.  Smart people who know literature tell me it is genius and wonderful.  I should be able to follow the plot better.  I shouldn't have to read lines over and over again trying to figure out what the hell he is saying.  I shouldn't be looking longingly at my next book about Pirates.  Shakespeare should have written about pirates.  This would be a lot cooler with one or two pirates..."

I finished hacking my way through the chicken bone of Shakespeare, and now I'm ready for a run to the connivance store for something more fitting to my palate.  Along the way, however, I developed a simple little theory that I like to call the "ESPN.com Shakespeare Corollary." The ESC simply states that your enjoyment of Shakespeare is inversely related to the amount of time you spend on ESPN.com.  I am convinced that there is something amongst the stats, 1,000 columnist opinions and 5,000 highlight videos that deadens the Shakespeare taste buds of your reading palate.  Now my current rate of ESPN.com consumption is not currently the subject of discussion, but my readers can safely assume that if my theory is true, there is little to no hope of my reading palate finding a home for Shakespeare.  I've tried to should myself into liking him but then, my ESPN.com palate starts smacking it's lips and looks at the book like it's some sort of grotesque poultry carcass remain.

All of that aside, there were two things in the Taming of the Shrew that improved my relationship with old Willie.  1) Shakespeare was a great comedian.  I had never read a Shakespeare comedy before and was pleasantly surprised.  While it was a bit less accessible and arduous than my favorite Will Ferrell comedy, I could picture several scenes on stage being absolutely hysterical.  And frankly, it was nice to read something that did not culminate in teenage suicide.  2)  Shakespeare was put on this earth for many reasons but one of them was so that we could steal a few of his glorious lines and whisper them in the ears of our sweeties.  Shakespeare is generous and kind, not proud and snobbish.  He looks down from heaven and smiles upon us ESPNers and says, "Here dear friend, steal my lines, stand on my shoulders, heed my guidance to woo the woman of your heart's eternal spring."   So gentlemen, I will pass on a few of his passion soaked pearls from The Taming of the Shrew along with a few ideas on how to implement them for maximum woo effect.  These are simple things that take hardly anytime and just a little planning.  Just trust me and most of all trust Shakespeare, the master of the woo.

Step 1:  The Morning Woo
Wake up a little early and with a dry erase marker write this in the mirror:

"Hast man beheld a fresher gentlewoman?
Such war of white and red within her cheeks!
What stars do spangle heaven with such beauty,
as those two eyes become that heavenly face?"

The impact of this will be magnified if you are not there in the morning. This builds what reading teachers like to call 'rising tension.'  As you will see we will build on this throughout the day.

Step 2: The Afternoon Woo:
On some sort of red or pink stationary write the following note and place it in something that she might find later in the day. 

Fair lovely maid, once more good day to thee:
Sweet (enter the name of your sweetie here) embrace her for her beauty's sake.

The note could go in her lunch, purse, maybe the windshield of her car in the middle of the day.  If your wife picks out her clothes the day before (why do they do this by the way?) maybe place it in one of her a pockets.  Whatever will reach her in the middle of the day will work just fine.

Step 3: Return Home Woo
"and happily I have arrived at last
Unto the wished haven of my bliss."

This one you will have to memorize, but I think we can swing that.  Use this last line when you see her for the first time after you get home from work.  Rush up to her before she has time to thank you for your sweet notes throughout the day, and whisper the above line in her ear in your most over dramatic, sweet, raspy whisper.  Now of course she'll giggle and laugh at you.  But that's the point, she'll giggle and laugh but she'll do it with a shy little smile looking down at the ground maybe even blushing a little bit. From there just make sure you have your chap stick because you'll be heading for a little place I like to call Smoochyville.

And that ladies and gentleman is a little bit of my 12 rounds with Shakespeare.  Thanks for reading! 

2 books down 23 to go!


peace,

td