Little information about William Shakespeare’s personal life is available, but from municipal records we can deduce that he was born in the English village of Stratford-upon-Avon, in the county of Warwickshire, on April 23, 1564, and that after retiring to his hometown around 1611, he died there on April 23, 1616, at exactly 52 years of age. Today marks the quadricentennial of the Bard’s death.
Many Bardolators (Shakespeare worshippers, and I am one of them) lament that the legacy of William Shakespeare is also dying. Only 8 percent of American colleges and universities require the reading of Shakespeare – for their English majors! – and the language of his plays and poems becomes increasingly inaccessible to American readers and playgoers. A multitude of publishers and play directors have translated Shakespeare into modern parlance, draining the text of its genius; and some teachers feel that Shakespeare’s body of work is no longer relevant to students of color.
But I assure you that Shakespeare is alive and well and living robustly in San Diego. To take one dramatic example, on Saturday, April 30, the 11th Annual Student Shakespeare Festival, sponsored by the San Diego Shakespeare Society, will be held at the Prado in Balboa Park. From 1 to 3 p.m. on four stages, troupes of K-12 students from 26 schools will act out 45 selections from Shakespeare’s plays.
Because Shakespeare’s works have been widely read in schools for centuries, many generations of students in their essays have gone from bard to worse in miscreating bardic bloopers. Here is a string of the brightest uncut and unpolished student gems:
Shakespeare never made much money and is famous only because of his plays and sonics. He lived at Windsor with his merry wives, writing hysterectomies, tragedies, comedies and errors. I don’t see why he is so popular when his writing skills are so low. He wrote in Islamic pentameter, and you can’t hardly understand what he is saying.
In one of Shakespeare’s infamous plays, Hamlet rations out his situation by relieving himself in a long soliloquy. A soliloquy is a conversation between one person. Hamlet has an edible complex, and his mind is filled with the filth of incestuous sheets which he pours over every time he sees his mother. In Act Five, Hamlet talks to Horatio about a skull that has been thrown up. Act Five comes right after Act Four.
In another play, Macbeth was from his mother’s womb untamely ripped. He is a strong man who turns bad and gradually gets worse. After Macbeth becomes the Thane of Candor, King Duncan wires Macbeth that he will be spending the night at his castle. Then Lady Macbeth tries to convince Macbeth to kill King Duncan by attacking his manhood. After Macbeth follows his wife’s odors and kills the king, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth suffer from quilt. They have so much quilt between them, they can’t sleep at night. By the end of the play, they get kilt. The proof that the witches in “Macbeth” were supernatural is that no one could eat what they cooked.
Romeo and Juliet are an example of a heroic couplet. This story presents a one on one situation between a man and a woman. Romeo and Juliet belong to the warring families of the Montagues and Copulates. Romeo sees Juliet for the first time at the massacred ball. They tell each other how much they are in love in the baloney scene.
When Juliet dies, they have a funeral in her wedding dress.
In “Julius Caesar,” Brutus is a tragic hero despite dying at the end. The toothslayer warns Caesar to beware the March of Dimes. When the Ides of March murder Julius Caesar, he gasps out the words “Eat you, Brutus!”
In “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” Puck turns Bottom’s head into an ass. The clown in “As You Like It” is named Touchdown. In that play, Shakespeare wrote, “All the world’s a stage, and everyone is just acting.”
Writing at the same time as Shakespeare was Miguel Cervantes. He wrote “Donkey Hote.” The next great author was John Milton. Milton wrote “Paradise Lost.” Then his wife died and he wrote “Paradise Regained.”