Should We Stop Teaching Shakespeare?
I was saddened to learn that proposed changes to New Zealand’s education system will see Shakespeare's plays disappear from the curriculum. It seems that Shakespeare is deemed too difficult for students.
Over the years, I’ve seen many stories like this come and go and the quality of Shakespeare education in schools is under constant threat.
Are Shakespeare’s plays really that difficult? I think not. Shakespeare is simply telling stories – and some of literature’s greatest stories at that. If students could just get over the language barrier, they would learn to enjoy Shakespeare’s plays.
I’ve always believed that anyone new to Shakespeare should perform the text, not read it. To enjoy Shakespeare’s plays as they were intended, students and teachers need to put down their dusty old books, get up and bring the text alive. This is the best way to appreciate the beauty and complexity of Shakespeare’s language. After all, Shakespeare wrote the plays for performance.
I hope that the education authorities in New Zealand will come to their senses. Rather that removing Shakespeare altogether, they should just rethink how they are teaching Shakespeare in their schools.
Do you find Shakespeare difficult? What are your tips to help struggling students?
Comments
Shakespeare is very easy to understand and i think that it broadens the horizion of understanding and life. the tip i can give is relate events that surround today’s students to the works
I grew up in a church which used Elizabethan English in its service, and I think that is why I have always loved Shakespeare. However, I can’t imagine how these plays can be interesting to a student who isn’t used to the language. We wouldn’t expect a student to read French or Spanish, etc. literature without taking French or Spanish language classes. Perhaps what we need are short classes in the language of Shakespeare before we asked teenagers to read and enjoy it.
When parents fail to read to children, children understand less of not just the written word but the spoken word. This may be why kids today do not understand Shakespeare. My son took a theatre class in Winchester, MA where the teacher originally taught one quarter of Shakespeare and three quarters contemporary theatre. What happened is that Shakespeare became more popular than modern plays and the class changed to a semester of Shakespeare and a semester of current work by popular demand.
BTW, there is something that I might say on behalf of the New Zealand decision to drop William of Avon. He was not a Maori.
I am not really interested in the Shakespeare stories but his literature is out of this world. He is as apt today as he was four hundred years ago. He was the supreme psychologist and his knowledge of the human being was profound.There has been a lot of change but still no change in the last four hundred years.Shakespeare brings it all home. Time is catching up with me–what a cruel hand!. It will never catch up with him.
If they really did that, they have no idea what they are going to deprive their children from!! Shakespeare is in no way difficult, the language might need some getting used to it, but that’s all. After struggling with the first play, you get the hang of it. Honestly, I’m a non-native, and i’ve never found difficulty with Shakespeare’s texts, so, I cann’t really imgaine how a native can!!!
The truth is: Shakespeare is much more interesting and a joy to read and to study more than modern lit.
And I think that education authorities in New Zealand don’t want their student to sweat. An that’s no way to gain any kind of education or knowledge. I really do hope they change their minds.
My tip for students: just be patient, watch and “act” the plays, and forget about assignments ad exams while reading. It will be pure pleasure, that’s what Shakespeare wrote for; pleasure.
The first book I purchased for myself was the complete works when I was 18. I am now 63. I have found over the years that almost every play is difficult for me for a few paragraphs until I get in the rhythm, and then it is just wonderful. I know the plays were written to be performed, but when I see a performance, I pay too much attention to the acting and lose something. I prefer to read the works.
The day that Will Shakespeare is banned from the curriculum is the start of the end of the world.
Shakespeare is difficult. The ear and mind have to become tuned. It helps to see great performances in movies, such as Jeremy Irons in The Merchant of Venice, or Derek Jacobi in Hamlet (as Hamlet in a BBC production from the 80’s and Claudius in the K.Branagh film). Watched the Branagh movie last summer, and about half way through, I suddenly got Shakespeare. I was stunned by the richness of this play. The character/personality of Hamlet rolls on and on and on in spirals with all the other characters. In school they told us simplistically that Hamlet’s problem is indecision, I guess to give us kids something to hang the character on. But Hamlet is humanity. I really think it’s the greatest play ever written (in English).
Shakespeare’s poetry found throughout the plays and sonnets can refresh your soul. “Love…is an ever-fixed mark that looks on tempests and is never shaken.” “…and when he die, cut him out in little stars that all the world will be in love with night..” “my bounty is as boundless as the sea, the more I give the more I have for both are infinite” — wow. The place to start is with the poetry.
So, I defenitly enjoy Shakespeare. However, I believe that it is wise to remove Shakespeare from high schools.
I’m a college sophomore today, and I remember in high school I hated Shakespeare. I couldn’t understand him at all. Now, I wasn’t stupid. I was used to getting A’s especially my English classes. I enjoyed reading and did so in my spare time as well.
But it wasn’t easy to simply “get over the language barrier.” I just don’t think high school english class students are mature enough to read the play and understand it.
As a result of that, the students end of hating one of the most world renowned and respected writers of all times. I would have still hated Shakespeare had I not run into a sonnet of his and fell in love with the writing, just a couple of months ago. Now my to do list for winter break includes reading Romeo and Juliet.
Yes, for fun! Imagine that!
Just a few plays should be taught because they are not easy or interesting at the beginning, then videos should be watched and finally teachers should have sts. perform parts of them.
Also having students see how they relate to the world nowadays and even trying to have fun with Shakespeare’s plays.
I’ve taught Shakespeare to Grade 6 students and university students and just about every grade in between. To say that it is too difficult for the students is absurd. It is an excuse for not reaching out and finding ways to communicate his work to students. If you can create Shakespeare stage productions catered to students you can certainly find ways to create a curriculum that teaches his works. It just takes a bit of effort.
Although people who should know better claim otherwise (like the linguist David Crystal), Shakespeare is quite a challenge for both readers and theatergoers to understand. Don’t forget that Shakespeare was trying to be difficult and nuanced, and that he spoke a dialect now 400 years old. Combine those two elements and we will most certainly struggle to understand actors running language at us in excess of 150 words a minute. Today our limited comprehension is not caused by poor education or laziness or distractions from the modern media.
After reading John McWhorter’s article on the difficulty of Shakespeare’s languague in Word on the Street, I began writing verse translations of Shakespeare’s plays. I try to increase our comprehension of the plays while maintaining the verse structure and complexity of the original. See http://www.fullmeasurepress.com for info.
Booktrisha’s comments hit the nail on the head. Most churches today for obvious reasons have abandoned the original King James version of the Bible. Regular exposure to that Bible’s language would have given earlier generations a head start on understanding Shakespeare (with signficantly decreased understanding of the Bible). It seems unrealistic, though, to have instruction in Elizabethan English since we read little from that period except Shakespeare.
I teach the Bard to black and Hispanic students; it’s tough at first, but we manage to get the story across. No matter whether it’s R & J, JC, or Macbeth, students can understand the conflicts of love and betrayal. Love it or hate it, Shakespeare’s works are a cultural thing that connects us to others in the past, present and future.
As an English teacher, let me express my anger at the idea of striking Shakespeare from any English literature curriculum. Students simply will not get any just view of where English literature has come from without reading Shakespeare–the stories he tells continue to pop up in our narratives even today (cases in point: ‘West Side Story’ ['Romeo and Juliet'], ‘10 Things I Hate About You’ ['The Taming of the Shrew'], and more recently, ‘Edgar Sawtelle’ ['Hamlet']). So what if he’s not Maori?! It’s ENGLISH class, isn’t it? This does not mean, of course, that non-English speaking writers should be excluded from any curriculum, far from it; but an English class without Shakespeare is like a sunny day without the sun…it just can’t happen!
And in regards to high school students being too immature for Shakespeare…you who think this are committing the greatest sin adults can ever commit against young people, and that is UNDERESTIMATING THEM. The only reason students in late middle school and through high school have a predisposed hatred of Shakespeare has nothing to do with the language; it has everything to do with YOU. Culture has stigmatized Shakespeare’s plays as being too “esoteric,” when in fact they are anything but. People need to stop making Shakespeare seem too difficult (i.e., off-hand comments like, “Oh I HATED Shakespeare in high school”) for kids because, honestly, it’s not.
If anything, students need to be exposed to Shakespeare EARLIER, as in late elementary (even earlier, in some cases). I have seen 5th graders perform ‘Julius Caesar’–and performed it WELL. I have even seen KINDERGARTENERS perform a scene from ‘Midsummer Night’s Dream’, where they were all little forest fairies wiggling their fingers above their heads in imitation of their sparkling auras, and it was nothing if not DAMN CUTE! If kids are exposed to the classics like Shakespeare early on, they will not run from them later on; in fact, this stigma that is built up against the likes of Shakespeare will disappear. They will get it because they CAN get it.
To those who continue to stigmatize Shakespeare and underestimate our kids’ abilities, let me crib a line from ‘Measure for Measure’ and say, “[Thou art] very superficial, ignorant, unweighing fellows.” HA.
Yes, the language can be tricky. Yes, it takes some effort and one must be patient. Yes, we should still teach Shakespeare; we would be remiss in our responsibilities as teachers if we didn’t introduce our students to the greatest writer in our language.
I find this whole thing ironic – math teachers would never entertain the idea of getting rid of quadratic equations because they are ‘too difficult’. And no one would even expect them to.
The most popular, talked-about programme on New Zealand TV is Outrageous Fortune. The title’s from Hamlet, as is the title of every episode of all five (so-far) series. As is the theme of life in a dodgy family. If Shakespeare’s irrelevant, why are the writers mining him so deeply for inspiration?
Secondly, a teacher has told me that Maori and Pacific Island students really relate to Shakespearean language – the formality and rhythm mirror Te Reo and Pacific languages more than they do modern English.
That’s all. We are time’s subjects, and time bids be gone. Noho ora mai.
Shakespeare was a fraud. The only reason he gained as critical acclaim as he had is because he was white. His plays are boring and irrelevant and individuals with enhanced ego’s like to quote him verbatim because they think it is witty and unique banter to exact a mood or in summation of a certain situation. Shakespeare is hogwash and always will be. Voltaire was correct about the Bard, more like the Turd!
http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?article_class=5&no=254905&rel_no=1
It is absolutely RIDICULOUS for ANYBODY to spend 1 millisecond on Shakespeare !!! It is totally INCOMPREHENSIBLE the man was INSANE and most likely on DRUGS !!
It is also totally INCOMPREHENSIBLE that people think that it is educational, it is CRAP !!