Malinda Knows!

September 21, 2007 in Shakespearean Language | No comments

From The Washington Post:

“My favorite is ‘You lily-livered, rabbit sucker,’ ” said 11-year-old Malinda Reese, a student at Janney Elementary School in Northwest Washington who visited the [Shakespeare] exhibition recently.

Malinda said she is a big fan of Shakespeare’s and thinks that other kids her age, or even younger, shouldn’t be intimidated by his works. “If you sit down in a comfy place, and you read Shakespeare and really try and figure out what he’s saying, you’ll find the story very interesting. And then the language is kind of magic,” she said.

(There’s that “rabbit-sucker” term… If anyone can tell me what that really means—whether it’s some sort of sucking rabbit, person who sucks rabbits, or weasel—I’d be very grateful.)

See, Melinda has realized how to enjoy Shakespeare, and she’s only 11. It’s something most adults and teachers don’t even understand:

Will’s exotic use of language is what makes his works so enjoyable.

Most people are put off by the archaic lexicon and pervasive linguistic devices, allusion, and imagery found in the plays. Instead, they’d prefer to just read the story without having to struggle through the language. I read a comment on the Shakespeare Tribe talking about how an audio version of Othello made the Old English more bearable and the story easier to enjoy.

Well, I’ve got news for you: as enjoyable as the characters and plots may be, they’re only 10% of the Bardic Experience. Hamlet has a very basic plot; so does Othello; so does Comedy of Errors; so do… all of them. If you’re reading Shakespeare for the story, you’re going to be disappointed. That’s why tools like No Fear Shakespeare should be used very carefully: not as Modern English substitutes for the Old English, but simply convenient translations to get through the sticky parts.

Stepping over Will’s language to get to the story is like condensing Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture into a single-note melody line on an electic keyboard and expecting it to be exciting. I’m being serious.

In order to appreciate Shakespeare (and then, in order to fall in love with Shakespeare), you have to love language. You have to be the kind of person that picks up books like Word Smart or The Deluxe Transitive Vampire for fun on a Friday night. You have to love puns. You have to be intrigued by etymology. You probably want to study other languages. Take the time to learn some words. Take the time to look at the footnotes. Take some time to try and understand Will’s wordplay. And a whole new universe of pleasure will open up to you.

I promise.

Malinda knows it, and now she’s ahead of the game (and her classmates). Her teachers will try to make the language easier for kids instead of trying to get them to love language. They’ll try to teach the story of Comedy of Errors (booooring!) instead of teaching kids how to love
(Err.II.1.317-319)

which is just teaching them how to love the English language. You spend every moment of your life thinking in your native language… Imagine how your thoughts could change if you understood your native language on a deeper level.

Tags: , , ,