Book Note: ShakesFear and How to Cure It

Cohen, Ralph Alan. ShakesFear and How to Cure It: The Complete Handbook for Teaching Shakespeare. The Arden Shakespeare,

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I chanced upon this book and started to dismiss it as another "You can't read Shakespeare unless it's been modernized and simplified and enervated" volume.

But a brief glance was all it took to let me know how wrong I was.

ShakesFear and How to Cure It is a thoughtful guide for teachers of all grades to what to do when the Shakespeare unit comes up in the curriculum. 

Not infrequently, students will tell me that they didn't realize how wonderful Shakespeare was until they took my class. Although I'd like to take that as a compliment on my teaching methods, it's actually that they've had a bad experience with Shakespeare somewhere in the past. Sometimes, that experience had to do with the was Shakespeare was taught.

The title of the book is directed that the fear some students feel at the thought of reading Shakespeare; however, the book itself is enormously useful in alleviating the fear that teachers have at the thought of teaching Shakespeare. This is the book for those teachers out there who are flummoxed with where to begin or how to teach or what to do with Shakespeare in the classroom.

I'm tempted to provide huge extracts from the book because it's such a good resource—even though I disagree with a lot of the recommendations. But that would be neither fair use nor fair play.

But I will provide the list of "Seven Deadly Preconceptions of Teaching Shakespeare" and the way Ralph Alan Cohen addresses the first two:

I'll also provide a list of Cohen's eight things not to do as a teacher of Shakespeare (thank heavens he says that we can do most of them sometimes) and what he makes of the first of them.

By way of contrast, I'm also providing the list of nine things you should do with Shakespeare:

Most teachers will find most of this advice sound and helpful; most students will learn more and have a better time doing so. I highly recommend reading through the whole book—and then determining what will work for you and your classroom.

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Shakespeare and Hathaway: Private Investigators

“O Brave New World.” By Paul Matthew Thompson and Jude Tindall. Perf. Mark Benton, Jo Joyner, and Patrick Walshe McBride. Dir. Piotr Szkopiak. Shakespeare and Hathaway. Season 1, episode 1. BBC. 25 February 2018. DVD. BBC, 2019.

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I'm pretty sure I discovered this series in the early days of the pandemic, watched them somewhat lackadaisically, saw there wasn't too much Shakespeare in them, and put them to the side.

But I'm teaching a new course under the heading Studies in the Novel. We're focusing on Mystery and Detective fiction, and I always like to take things a Shakespearean direction when it's possible to do so.

Accordingly, the class recently watched the first episode of the series Shakespeare and Hathaway, a cosy mystery series set in Stratford-on-Avon.

The first episode establishes the Private Investigation team of Louella Shakespeare and Frank Hathaway—the origin of a partnership that is now filming its sixth season.

Warning: Spoilers Follow.

The show starts with the down-and-out (though hardly hard-boiled) detective Frank Hathaway trying to keep his business together. He's approached by Louella Shakespeare, a bride-shortly-to-be who suspects her fiancé of infidelity.

Frank takes photos of the fiancé at a fancy luncheon with his secretary, but Louella is satisfied with the fiancé's explanations, and the wedding goes forward.

But not without a last-minute attempt by Frank to convince Louella that there's something shady and suspicious going on.

That leads us to the first part of our clip—and one that gives us both the faux-Shakespearean kitsch of Stratford and a bit of Shakespeare. The second part of the clip has one more Shakespeare quote; the final clip will be explained in due course.

This episode has more Shakespeare than most (though I may be mis-remembering my earlier experience of the show—I haven't re-watched the entire series). We first get the almost-route Sonnet 116: "Let me not to the marriage of true minds / Admit impediment" (1–2). I appreciated how the show itself zones out at that point.

And I appreciate (though I don't fully understand) the unusual choices the bride and groom made for their vows. Did you recognize them? I had to look them up. They're from Venus and Adonis. The bride says

Love's gentle spring doth always fresh remain. (801)

And the groom replies

Love is all truth, lust full of forged lies. (804)

The context is a very lengthy speech by Adonis. The stanza in question contrasts love and lust:

William Shakespeare,The Poems, ed. F. T. Prince (Arden, 2000)

It's an interesting choice for wedding vows. I imagine the show is going for the "forged lies" part—which is exactly what the fiancé has been doing.

We then get a quote from 3 Henry VI when Frank and his assistant are discussing the motives and suspects for the fiancé's murder (I did warn you that there would be spoilers):  ". . . wet my cheeks with artificial tears" (III.ii.184).

The last part of the clip sets the new firm of Shakespeare and Hathaway on its way. I'm including it because we also read The Maltese Falcon in my Mystery and Detective Fiction class. In that Dashiell Hammett novel, the detective orders that the name of his just-murdered partner be taken off the signage; here, we have that reversed as Louella Shakespeare's name joins Frank Hathaway's.

The show is quite good—a fine example of the genre. It just needs more Shakespeare. 

[Note: If I find the time, I'll try more episodes of the show to see if we're given any more Shakespeare. In other words, further bulletins as events warrant.]

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Links: The Episode at IMDB.

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Book Note: Hamlet Off Stage

Berry, D. C . Hamlet Off Stage. Texas Review Press, 2009.

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Longtime readers will know that I try to keep my finger on the pulse of modern literature that relates to Shakespeare.

Sometimes, that takes the form of poetry, as in the volume In a Fine Frenzy: Poets Respond to Shakespeare (q.v. for a representative example).

I don't remember where in my vast and copious reading this book came up, but I do know that I requested it, waited for it, checked it out, and put it in the pile for later. While it sat there, my mind placed it in the "plays to read" category.

But it's a collection of poems written from Hamlet's point of view.

And this Hamlet is a very angry one.

The collection as a whole doesn't altogether work. It's a bit too one-note, and that note is an uncomfortable one to hear. That's likely the intention, but it does get fairly old fairly quickly.

Nonetheless, I'd like to call our collective attention to three poems that stand out. The first is highly critical of the 1990 Zeffirelli film version of Hamlet—the one with Mel Gibson in the title role:

I like the play of sounds there, and the final line is good (though I don't know that I agree with its sentiment).

Next, we have a play on the character T. S. Eliot created who said, "No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be":

The advice is clear: Don't be like Prufrock. Whether Hamlet is able to follow that advice is uncertain.

Last, we have one where the poet uses all the different names for Hamlet that have been developing throughout the series:

That one is of primary interest in the way the multitude of names reflects the variety of perspectives on Hamlet.

One of these three may make its way into the syllabus when next I teach my Modern Shakespearean Fiction course, but the entirely collection won't.

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