This is my boyfriend Hamlet. And this is Hamlet’s boyfriend, Horatio.
the thing about shakespeare is that when it’s done right, when it’s done well, it should sound like it’s coming from the soles of your shoes, being dredged up from the dark places in your lungs and exhaled in a rush, before it burns your mouth. There are pauses, swallows, reverberations, inflections, because how else are you to laugh and sing and snarl and spill forth these lines?
shakespeare done well by actors who know what they’re doing stops sounding like shakespeare. It slips inside your blood, inflects you brain, raging through your system until this is the only language you have ever known, will ever need. It makes the theater the world entire.
shakespeare should sound like lightning; it should turn the air silver.
and once you’ve witnessed that, it’s hard to accept anything less.
caitlinisactuallyawritersname:
…And by the way, it’s worth remembering that Hamlet is basically fanfiction.
c#most of Shakespeare’s works draw heavily from older stories #but he’s a dude so it’s totally legit and not lame at all right
Do you bite your thumb at us, sir?
i do bite my thumb, sir
Do you bite your thumb at us, sir?
is the law on our side if i say ay?
No
no, sir, i do not bite my thumb at you sir; but I bite my thumb, sir
Do you quarrel, sir?
quarrel, sir? no sir
if you do, sir, i am for you: i serve as good a man as you
No better
well, sir
DOST THOU WANT TO FUCKING GO, SIR?
DOST THOU THINK THOU CAN FUCKING TAKE ME, BRO?
DOST THOU EVEN HOIST? OUT TO THE COURT YARD, WITH HASTE.
Is it bad that I start my work day by muttering the “Once more unto the breach dear friends, once more” speech?
And if the link isn’t working (I’m on mobile) http://youtu.be/c5lhfKUFNN8