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CAT Tracks for August 5, 2009
bt w8, wuz dat lyt n d wndw ovr der? |
Methinks the Bard and I Shall Sticketh to Our English of Olde..."Early Modern", actually!
From the Houston Chronicle...
Are Shakespeare and texting compatible?
By BRENDA BERNET Associated Press
AMARILLO, Texas (AP) — Most teenage girls today wouldn't go to the trouble of saying “Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?” It would be more like “Y R U Romeo?”
But nearly 400 years after his death, references to William Shakespeare abound in American culture. Filmmakers still make blockbuster movies out of his stories. The film “10 Things I Hate About You” is based on Shakespeare's “The Taming of the Shrew.” Disney Channel's “The Suite Life of Zack and Cody” produced a “Romeo and Juliet” episode. And so high school English teachers take on the daunting task each year of teaching “Romeo and Juliet” and other deeply layered Shakespearean works to a generation more accustomed to texting in abbreviation.
It's not easy.
“The language is terrible,” said RayLene Dysert, who teaches freshmen composition at West Texas A&M University and led a recent workshop on teaching Shakespeare for high school teachers.
Dysert's students often protest, “The dude's not even speaking English.”
And that's the irony. It is English — however archaic it's become.
But the language has changed, and Shakespeare's plays require students to stop and think, Dysert said. She has students read a play three times, the first time for the language, the second to grasp the story line and the third to get a feel for the rhythm of the language.
Shakespeare understood human behavior, and universal themes in his plays are timeless, Dysert said. He wrote about greed, lust, betrayal, manipulation, tyrants, love, politics, gender and class.
“Aren't there couples that want to be together despite their parents' wishes?” she asked about 30 teachers who recently attended a workshop on making Shakespeare relevant.
English teacher Tanner Hargrove gives his seniors at Canyon High School as little warning as possible that they soon will read “Hamlet.”
“It's unavoidable to get through your senior year without Shakespeare,” Hargrove said. “Some love it. Some grow to like it. Some will never like it.”
Hargrove introduces Shakespeare with a song. He tells students to write all the words and phrases they hear in the song on a sheet of paper. Some will write four or five words; others compile entire phrases.
But what they hear is a nonexistent language developed by an Icelandic band, Sigur Ros, he tells them afterward.
“It's just syllables they put together that don't make sense,” Hargrove said.
If they can understand Sigur Ros, students certainly can read a play written in English, he argues.
“Language is evolving,” Hargrove said. “I personally think that language will always evolve.”
For English class, some students have to make a conscious effort to include commas and punctuation and to spell out, rather than abbreviate, common prepositions or words.
In her classroom writing, Monique Alcantar, 17, often shortens “please” to “plz,” “what” to “wat” and “because” to “cuz.”
“Everybody's just on the go all the time,” said the Caprock High School senior. “It's so much faster to use your slang language.”
But Shakespeare is difficult to follow and often presents challenging words, she said. Classroom vocabulary lessons prior to reading the Bard's plays help students navigate “Romeo and Juliet” and “Julius Caesar,” she said.
“You really have to pay attention.”
Shakespeare played with language, said Shawn Martin, artistic director for Amarillo Repertory Theatre. A grave digger in Shakespeare is pure comedy. This year's production of “Much Ado About Nothing” is a love story built around eavesdropping and laden with puns and innuendo.
“His goal was to entertain,” he said. “He did sex, drugs and violence, and that's what appealed to the masses and has for 400 years.”
For audiences to understand the performances, Martin's cast has to know what the characters are saying. He keeps a copy and translation of the play and a 6-inch dictionary close by during rehearsals.
“I don't think it's entertaining to read,” he said. “Performing Shakespeare is a riot.”
Terisa King hears the familiar groan each year from sophomores and seniors at Richard Milburn Academy who complain about the language, the length of the plays and dialogue. She plays movie clips and uses related graphic novels to make it more palatable.
“If we could Twitter Julius Caesar, we'd be good,” King said.
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Need help interpreting Shakespeare? The Web site SparkNotes (nfs.sparknotes.com) provides a modern English translation of many plays. Then take the modern-day translation and plug it into an online translator at lingo2word.com for help with texting. Here's an example:
Romeo and Juliet
Act 2, Scene II from the balcony scene
But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief,
That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.
In Text:
Bt w8, wuz dat lyt n d wndw ovr der?
Itz d east, n Juliet S d sun.
Rise , btifl sun, n kil d jLs m%n .
d m%n S alrdy sick n pale W grief
coz u, Juliet, her maid, r mor btifl thN she.
