"We quote Shakespeare all the time." Judi Densch
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Listen to her re-tell Sonnet #29.
Link to videoHow she intones, and pauses...
"Then, haply, I think on thee..."
And how her tone changes in the final lines.
Wonderful.
When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state,And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself and curse my fate,Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,Desiring this man’s art and that man’s scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,(Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven’s gate;For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings."Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
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When I was in high school, we studied King Lear. When I managed to make it to college, my English prof happened to be a Shakespearean Scholar. Guy may have looked like a leprechaun, but he knew his Shakespeare. Depending on what we were doing, he'd often launch into a piece of King Henry, Othello or Hamlet, etc.
But my favorite was the day he leaped on top of his desk and delivered the Fool's Soliloquy from King Lear. It's one thing to read Shakespeare. It's something else to hear it done the way it was supposed to be delivered and done well...
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When I was in high school, we studied King Lear. When I managed to make it to college, my English prof happened to be a Shakespearean Scholar. Guy may have looked like a leprechaun, but he knew his Shakespeare. Depending on what we were doing, he'd often launch into a piece of King Henry, Othello or Hamlet, etc.
But my favorite was the day he leaped on top of his desk and delivered the Fool's Soliloquy from King Lear. It's one thing to read Shakespeare. It's something else to hear it done the way it was supposed to be delivered and done well...
@Jolly said in "We quote Shakespeare all the time." Judi Densch:
When I was in high school, we studied King Lear. When I managed to make it to college, my English prof happened to be a Shakespearean Scholar. Guy may have looked like a leprechaun, but he knew his Shakespeare. Depending on what we were doing, he'd often launch into a piece of King Henry, Othello or Hamlet, etc.
But my favorite was the day he leaped on top of his desk and delivered a Fool's Soliloquy from King Lear. It's one thing to read Shakespeare. It's something else to hear it done the way it was supposed to be delivered and done well...
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I actually understand that poem. Hey @Aqua-Letifer, do you suppose Shakespeare would have been remembered for his poetry, if not for his plays?
@Horace said in "We quote Shakespeare all the time." Judi Densch:
I actually understand that poem. Hey @Aqua-Letifer, do you suppose Shakespeare would have been remembered for his poetry, if not for his plays?
I really don't know. I'm going to guess not, though, because his plays had a much stronger and more widespread impact.
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Listen to her re-tell Sonnet #29.
Link to videoHow she intones, and pauses...
"Then, haply, I think on thee..."
And how her tone changes in the final lines.
Wonderful.
When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state,And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself and curse my fate,Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,Desiring this man’s art and that man’s scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,(Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven’s gate;For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.@George-K said in "We quote Shakespeare all the time." Judi Densch:
Listen to her re-tell Sonnet #29.
Link to videoHow she intones, and pauses...
"Then, haply, I think on thee..."
And how her tone changes in the final lines.
Wonderful.
When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state,And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself and curse my fate,Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,Desiring this man’s art and that man’s scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,(Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven’s gate;For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.Actors go one of two routes with performing with metre. They either inject hard rests at every line break, or recite more colloquially.
Densch is quite obviously the former. I think there's a pretty clear caesura in "From sullen earth" but she didn't recite it that way. Which is completely fine, it's just a different way to perform it. Still marvelous.
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@George-K said in "We quote Shakespeare all the time." Judi Densch:
Listen to her re-tell Sonnet #29.
Link to videoHow she intones, and pauses...
"Then, haply, I think on thee..."
And how her tone changes in the final lines.
Wonderful.
When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state,And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself and curse my fate,Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,Desiring this man’s art and that man’s scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,(Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven’s gate;For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.Actors go one of two routes with performing with metre. They either inject hard rests at every line break, or recite more colloquially.
Densch is quite obviously the former. I think there's a pretty clear caesura in "From sullen earth" but she didn't recite it that way. Which is completely fine, it's just a different way to perform it. Still marvelous.
@Aqua-Letifer said in "We quote Shakespeare all the time." Judi Densch:
Still marvelous.
Isn't it, though?
I've been familiar with this sonnet since, well, before I married Mrs. George. However, I don't think I've ever heard it read. Her reading was beautiful, poignant (in the first half), and uplifting in the end.
"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
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You can visit the house where Shakespeare was born in 1564.
I visited there 427 years after his birth.You wouldn't want to live there, but the age and the history make it somewhat interesting.
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Now, if Shakespeare had actually wrote all this stuff...
“Cry havoc and let slip the DOGE of war!”
Those who cheered as J-6 American prisoners were locked in solitary for 18 months without trial, now suddenly fight tooth and nail for foreign terrorists’ "due process". — Buck Sexton
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@Aqua-Letifer said in "We quote Shakespeare all the time." Judi Densch:
Still marvelous.
Isn't it, though?
I've been familiar with this sonnet since, well, before I married Mrs. George. However, I don't think I've ever heard it read. Her reading was beautiful, poignant (in the first half), and uplifting in the end.
@George-K said in "We quote Shakespeare all the time." Judi Densch:
@Aqua-Letifer said in "We quote Shakespeare all the time." Judi Densch:
Still marvelous.
Isn't it, though?
I've been familiar with this sonnet since, well, before I married Mrs. George. However, I don't think I've ever heard it read. Her reading was beautiful, poignant (in the first half), and uplifting in the end.
You can't recite Shakespeare as well as that without truly knowing it. Props.
Fun story:
I can count on one hand the number of times I've recited poetry out loud. But a couple of months ago I just couldn't help myself.
There was a Viking reenactment group at the Sheep & Wool festival here. (They took it pretty seriously—some of the women there practiced seiðr.) They mentioned they were looking for a scald.
For my Master's, I wrote about 47 pages worth of fornyrðislag alliterative verse because I'm a nerd like that. I had the full-page prologue memorized because I had such a bitch of a time working on it. So without pretense I laid it on him. He about shit his pants and it was pretty much the one and only time I applied my Master's directly to anything out in the world.
He gave me the group's contact info, but I never followed up. It'd be a hell of a lot of fun but I know reenactors. That kind of thing is a lifestyle commitment and there's just not enough time in a day. -
@Jolly said in "We quote Shakespeare all the time." Judi Densch:
Now, if Shakespeare had actually wrote all this stuff...
Oh, okay...
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The thing is, this sonnet's language is SO approachable. Once one knows what "bootless" and "haply" mean, the rest is easy.
But his plays require so much work to understand. Yeah, the stories are unparalleled, but so, for me, unapproachable.
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The thing is, this sonnet's language is SO approachable. Once one knows what "bootless" and "haply" mean, the rest is easy.
But his plays require so much work to understand. Yeah, the stories are unparalleled, but so, for me, unapproachable.
@George-K said in "We quote Shakespeare all the time." Judi Densch:
The thing is, this sonnet's language is SO approachable. Once one knows what "bootless" and "haply" mean, the rest is easy.
But his plays require so much work to understand. Yeah, the stories are unparalleled, but so, for me, unapproachable.
Read some Felix Dennis.
Formal verse, some of it brilliant, but all very decent and completely approachable.
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Decades ago, I told Mrs. George how much I loved that sonnet.
She found a copy of it, and wrote it out on a piece of paper. Then, she mounted it on a piece of wood.
It's hanging on the wall of the hall to @Sidney's room.
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Decades ago, I told Mrs. George how much I loved that sonnet.
She found a copy of it, and wrote it out on a piece of paper. Then, she mounted it on a piece of wood.
It's hanging on the wall of the hall to @Sidney's room.
@George-K said in "We quote Shakespeare all the time." Judi Densch:
Decades ago, I told Mrs. George how much I loved that sonnet.
She found a copy of it, and wrote it out on a piece of paper. Then, she mounted it on a piece of wood.
It's hanging on the wall of the hall to @Sidney's room.
That is positively badass. An amazing thing she made.
I also love the presentation, and her handwriting.
