January 7th, 2013 - Read Hamlet

 

I have always been a book worm.  I love getting lost in the worlds that authors create, and I love the words they use to envision such worlds.  It's not surprising that because of this love of the written word, I decided to major in English in college.  It also didn't hurt that half way through junior year, I realized that I would end up going insane as a teacher, and thus Education was a major that didn't quite fit my interests.

My tastes in literature are not limited to one specific genre.  I'm a fan of the pulp crime novels of Raymond Chandler, and the wacky sci-fi yarns of Douglas Adams.  I've poured over nearly ever story written by Stephen King, and I've hung on the words of John Irving and J.K. Rowling.  I've read Pulitzer Prize winning classics (if you haven't read A Confederacy of Dunces or The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, stop what you're doing and do so NOW), and I've waxed nostalgic over children's books (how great is The Phantom Tollbooth anyway?!)

I've also read the classics.  Pride and Prejudice is one of my favorite books, and my bucket list includes reading everything Charles Dickens ever wrote, saving Our Mutual Friend as the last book I'll ever read (ok, I picked that one up from Desmond on LOST, sue me).  Reading the classics means I've also read Shakespeare, well, at least, some of it.

Starting in my freshmen year of high school, I was perpetually exposed to the arcane vernacular that resides in the works of the Bard.  It started with Romeo and Juliet, and worked it's way through Julius Caesar, Othello, Richard III, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Macbeth (my teacher insisted on referring to it only as "The Scottish Play"), Henry V (where my favorite speech that Shakespeare wrote, the "Crispin's Day Speech," can be found), The Merchant of Venice, and my favorite, Much Ado About Nothing.  And I say it's my favorite probably because I liked the Kenneth Branagh movie so much.

Notice something that wasn't on that list?  Yup, it's Hamlet.

I find it strange that for someone who loves literature so much, and who studied it at both the undergraduate and graduate level, i managed to skip over reading Hamlet.   It's such a titan of literature, and it's so well known ("To not be or not to kinda sorta be"...or something like that), that I find it weird that during the course of my education, I missed out on it.

In the spirit of this project and blog, I decided to rectify the situation.  So, during lunch, bathroom breaks, and a few painfully dull hours after work, I read the Tragedy of the Prince of Denmark.

And I guess it was because I'd already seen film adaptations of the story, or that I had seen the wonderfully existential Tom Stoppard play, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, or that the story of Hamlet's revenge against his uncle was so well known to me.  But in the end, I didn't see what the hub bub was, bub.

Now, I know what you're thinking, who am I to judge Shakespeare?  I just feel like there are far greater works by Will that get overlooked.  Sure, Hamlet  is a great story.  But I thought that the violence and tragedy in Othello was far more interesting.  Hamlet is a great character?  Well, Richard III is better.  Yes, there are some fantastic speeches and quotes in Hamlet.  But there are better ones in better plays (again, the aforementioned Henry V). Shakespeare, if nothing else, knew how to string famous quotes together.

Ultimately, I'm glad that i read it and I'm glad that it's off my list.  Now go, and bid the soldiers shoot.