Hello, Blogspot!

This post was supposed to serve three purposes:

1) To welcome myself back to blogging and let y'all know that I'm over here at Blogspot now. Here I am. Wave hi.

2) To rebut against Jake and Jeff's argument about...something. I can't remember what now. Dammit, how am I supposed to argue if I can't remember what it is I'm arguing about?

and

3) Since both of those were utterly stupid, I now have to say something intelligent to prove my worth to the general world, and show that I do know something worth giving a damn about. Here goes (and thanks to Leila for reminding me why I'm passionate about this subject):

Shakespeare is meant to be heard and not read. He never wrote a whole script in his life, and it wasn't until the first Folio that people could actually read the whole text of plays. Add that to the fact that any editor of any Shakespeare text anywhere is doing just that--editing--and you have a world full of people who don't know what the fuck the guy was saying. Read your text out loud. Use iambic pentameter if the speech is written in verse. Pause if there's punctuation, don't pause if there isn't any. Keep a dictionary by you for words you don't know. (This one is my favorite.) Listen to what the character is telling you. And your life will be so much easier.

The above was a veeeery condensed version of the lecture I give to any of my students who complain about reading Shakespeare. Especially if they want to read the version "in English." I don't care if you love the guy. Hell, I don't care if you like him. But you have to understand why we're still reading his works.

Thanks for indulging me. I'll go back to writing idiocy now.