James Badger > Recent Status Updates

I finally have time to sit down and read this.

A surprising number of the sonnets are written in an attempt to encourage beautiful women to have babies. Shakespeare held the opinion that beauty was lost if it wasn't passed on to the next generation.

It's been too long since I updated, so I'll give letter grades to the plays I've read.
1 Henry IV - B
Merry Wives of Windsor - A
2 Henry IV - B+
Much Ado About Nothing - A+
Henry V - A
Julius Caesar - B+
As You Like It - B
Hamlet - A+
Twelfth Night - A
Troilus and Cressida - C+

I have a great deal of trouble with the character of Shylock in this play. He does have the great "prick us, do we not bleed" line, but is otherwise an embodiment of every bad Jewish stereotype imaginable.

Regarding The Life and Death of King John, I'll simply quote the well-known song: "Too late to be known as John the first, he'll surely be known as John the worst."

After reading the Henry VI quadrilogy, as well as Richard II, it is clear that Shakespeare had no love for kings whose given name is Richard.

I don't know where Romeo and Juliet got the reputation of being a great love story. It is nothing of the sort. In any other context, Romeo and Juliet's immediate love would be absolutely unbelievable. This is not a love story. It's a warning about hate, and tribalism. Romeo and Juliet's love story, thin and underdeveloped as it is, is a side plot.

A Midsummer Night's Dream has always been a favorite. It's too bad I will never be able to read it again without seeing in my mind the glazed-over eyes of my students who hated every single moment they spent reading this play.

Love's Labours Lost begins with a sort of silly premise that you know will fall apart by the end of the play (the title alone is evidence of this). This is not to say that the play wasn't satisfying, because it absolutely was.

In the 1990's, my older sister saw The Comedy of Errors at a Shakespeare festival, and her description of it ignited my initial interest in Shakespeare. Funny that it's taken me so long to read this play.

The Rape of Lucrece is the second of two narrative poems in the Shakespearean canon. It is an improvement over Venus and Adonis in every measurable way. It is more interesting, more expertly written, and generally more empathetic than Venus and Adonis.

Venus and Adonis is a fairly pointless and lengthy poem in which the majority of the stanzas describe unrequited love in painful detail. There isn't much Shakespeare I don't enjoy, but this is certainly an entry on that short list.

Richard III is a fitting end to the Henry VI quadrilogy. If you love villainy, there's plenty to be had in this play. I especially loved the ending in which Richard finds that everyone (even the dead) have turned against him. This play is very karmically satisfying.

1 Henry VI is the prequel the entire series of Henry VI plays really needed. It sets the table for everything that follows, only everything which follows has already followed...provided you read the plays in chronological order, which I am doing.

I read Titus Andronicus with my honors students, and those who paid attention found that they really enjoyed it. Shakespeare's senseless violence really careens out of control in this play, much to the delight of people who enjoy such things. I am one of them.

Now that I have read 3 Henry VI, I can see why Shakespeare chose it. It's the clear inspiration for Game of Thrones.

Also, yes, I read Shakespeare when I'm home sick.

If the plays in The Oxford Shakespeare are arranged chronologically, as the text purports them to be, then it seems an odd choice for Shakespeare to begin his histories with the second part of King Henry VI. Henry VI was both weak and unpopular, and it is no small miracle that Shakespeare was able to turn him into an even remotely sympathetic character. I was surprised to have enjoyed this play as much as I did.

During my master's program, I wrote a paper which argued that "Taming of the Shrew" could be read as a work of subversive feminism. It's interesting to still see those evidences as I reread this play.

My one gripe for "Taming of the Shrew" is that Shakespeare could have done so much more with his framing device.

"The Two Gentlemen of Verona" was a delightful read. If Shakespeare's outlaws in this play were not a direct influence on "The Pirates of Penzance," I shall be very surprised indeed.

I was also pleased to see two grand old Shakesperean tropes in this play: 1) The servant who is much smarter than his master (Speed) and 2) The servant who is much dumber than anyone dare imagine (Lance).

Now when anyone asks, “How was Dante’s Purgatorio?” I can respond , “Meh,” and have it be both a hilarious joke and an accurate review. So there’s that.

This book has the appearance of a scientific approach, but is riddled with presupposition and flawed epistemology.

Mark was the most enjoyable of the four gospels. It didn't have the heavy-handed agenda of Matthew or Luke, and it was more approachable than John. Of course being written first doesn't hurt either.

1000 pages of bible now behind me! Woohoo! It's all minor prophets, parables, and epistles from here on out.

The Book of Ecclesiastes is by far the best book in the bible. It has a certain existential angst when considering the inevitability of death and the inability of men to leave a lasting and meaningful legacy. I just love that kind of stark honesty. Who isn't bothered by the fact that they are going to die someday? Anyway, thanks to Ecclesiastes for being a breath of fresh air in an otherwise stale book.