Shakespeare
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Shakespearing #37: The Tempest
Shakespearing #37 by David Foley The Tempest Sometimes it takes a production that doesn’t work to make you understand how a play does. As I re-read The Tempest, I wondered guiltily if I’d ever much liked it. Coming after Cymbeline and The Winter’s Tale, it felt tepid. Where was the drama, the deep emotion? The next Continue reading
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Shakespearing #31: Antony and Cleopatra
Shakespearing #31 by David Foley Antony and Cleopatra One reason I wouldn’t be a good playwriting teacher is that I wouldn’t know how to teach inconsistency. It’s one of those things I think you either get or you don’t, one of those things that suggest certain elements of writing can’t be taught. Mostly I mean Continue reading
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Shakespearing #28.1: Four Observations About Othello
Shakespearing #28.1 by John King Four Observations About Othello 1. In Shakespeare is Hard, But So is Life, the Irish theater critic Fintan O’Toole says, If you look at the character of Othello in isolation, and in particular if you look at him through the notion of the “tragic flaw’, then he is not, for all Continue reading
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Shakespearing #27: Measure for Measure
Shakespearing #27 by David Foley Measure for Measure When I was in college, I was robbed at gunpoint coming home from buying a pint of ice cream. They took my coat, they took my watch, they took the ice cream, and when they discovered I had only a few dollars on me, one of them Continue reading
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Shakespearing #23: Hamlet
Shakespearing #23 by David Foley Hamlet For a certain kind of theatre/English lit nerd, Hamlet was our Catcher in the Rye. Hamlet not Holden was the disaffected hero who awakened our sense that we were surrounded by phonies in a messed-up world. I remember being puzzled to learn that scholars argued back and forth about Continue reading
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Episode 126: A Craft Discussion About Horace’s Ars Poetica, with Vanessa Blakeslee!
Episode 126 of The Drunken Odyssey, your favorite podcast about creative writing and literature is available on iTunes, or right click here to download. In this week’s episode, I talk about Horace’s Ars Poetica with Vanessa Blakeslee, plus Sam Slaughter talks about the ignominious beginning of Two Drunken Writers Brewery. NOTES At 3 P.M., on Tuesday, November 18, the Continue reading
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Shakespearing 17.2: Lears
Shakespearing 17.2 by David Foley Lears (An Interlude) Note: In my project of reading all of Shakespeare’s plays in order, I’m still a long way from King Lear. What follows are thoughts about seeing a recent production. When I entered NYU’s Skirball Center a couple of weeks ago—exhausted from four hours of teaching, a little Continue reading
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Shakespearing #8: The Taming of the Shrew
Shakespearing #8 by David Foley The Taming of the Shrew In my memory, The Taming of the Shrew was a rambunctious farce with two larger-than-life roles and a Stepford Wives ending. On reacquaintance, it’s a joyous work of art. But about that ending: the reasons Kate gives for submitting to Petruchio are not comfortable, but they Continue reading
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Shakespearing #2: Henry VI, Part 1
Shakespearing #2 by David Foley Henry VI, Part 1 Let’s imagine that Shakespeare has been hanging around London theatre for a while, acting in productions but also using his “honey’d” way with words to tart up some old warhorses for this or that company, and finally someone persuades him to write, or he persuades them Continue reading
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Episode 94: Eleanor Lerman!
Episode 94 of The Drunken Odyssey, your favorite podcast about creative writing and literature, is available on iTunes, or right click here to download. On this week’s show, I talk to the poet Eleanor Lerman, Plus Alden Jones writes about her time working in Cuba. TEXTS DISCUSSED Check out episode 48 to hear Eleanor Lerman’s essay about Leonard Cohen’s Spice Box Continue reading
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