Presentation magic

I have been so impressed with the presentations that everyone has given these last two class periods. Bravo! Yes, even if they were pulled together at the last minute, which you truly couldn't suspect any group of doing. Maybe that is my suspension of disbelief talking. I don't know. But they were all wonderfully done.

Part of the reason I think I've enjoyed them so much, is because seeing these plays performed manifests an experience that is worlds apart from what one encounters when simply reading a play. Whether a group decided to focus on one scene in Shakespearean language, or summarize the entire play in 'dude language', the effect was the same. We were introduced to new and unique interpretations of Shakespeare. Perhaps the presentations made it easier to understand Shakespeare's humor, or the true purpose of his 'nothing' dialogues, or how it is so easy for the characters of a play to be fooled by a simple disguise or costume.


For me, the chance to watch my peers act out Shakespeare helped me to appreciate the theatrical aspect of his works. The dynamics between characters, their facial expressions, stage directions, and overall enthusiasm brought the plays to life. This whole semester I've focused my attention on the poetic dialogue, the double meaning in words, and efforts to detect any reference to the mythological (which were largely unproductive and somewhat in vain, because as we all know, the mythic is Shakespeare, it is a constant echo that reverberates throughout every speech, every line, and every word. But that is another blog) in the that plays we've read.

But now I'm seeing Shakespeare as something that can be both enjoyed and toiled over. Am I finally starting to resent a little less that monstrous red book that makes me dread hauling my backpack around campus on Tuesdays and Thursdays? Is it appropriate that this whole time I have been equating the magnitude and weight of Shakespeare with the weight of that book? Perhaps.

But of course, as soon as I feel the veil of ignorance lifted from my eyes, the burden of consciousness sets in. And I know I'm successfully nearing the end of a Sexson class, because I feel just as confused and tortured as I did at the beginning. Oh the cycle of Sexson, how wonderful yet unbreakable you are.