Andrew T.

Stratford-Upon-Avon and my trip to this historical location opened my eyes and allowed me to truly appreciate Shakespeare and his extraordinary works of literature. The pre-performance discussions of the plays helped prepare me for the small nuances that I probably would have missed otherwise, the actual viewing of the plays helped me understand certain aspects that I did not understand from the plays in written form, and the post-performance discussions of the plays really solidified my understanding of the plays.

Prior to undertaking this class, Shakespeare and his works of literature were extremely daunting to me -- they still are but I believe I have slightly moved up the path towards understanding his works. Any help given to me was taken with great appreciation. The pre-performance discussions really helped in this aspect: they gave me help, regardless of their helpfulness’s worth, and as help it was taken. I remember thinking that the character activities we did for The City Madam were strange and outlandish. I mean why would we need to how characters aligned with each other in terms of worth or influence? I kept thinking that until we actually saw the play after which I had a slap-on-the-forehead moment with myself and realized how if I had not received that pre-performance preparation that I would have really struggled with The City Madam, a play that had an almost hierarchal system of naming that I would have missed otherwise. Cardenio and its pre-performance discussion/lecture were placed in a similar situation for me. I somewhat feel that the general trend would be that pre-performance preparation really helped with plays that I was alien and foreign to but the pre-performance preparation work was still helpful for plays that we were studying or had studied. With The Merchant of Venice, the trend continued. Just prior to the first time we watched The Merchant of Venice in the Royal Shakespeare Theater, I had only read up to Act 2 scene 7 or so of The Merchant of Venice. The preparation work helped fill in the gaps. I remember Kate/Cait -- I forget how her name was spelled -- telling me to pay attention to a particular elevator scene as that was the scene Javier and I were doing as our scene for the week. She told us the scene could either be amusing or boring depending on the way it was depicted. This combined with Javier’s and my work on our scene gave me a general idea what the scene was and how it would be portrayed. Even though I’m not sure if this was actually preparation work for the play, in my mind it was as it led me to understand a scene that I had not yet seen.

I’m a visual person and visual props tend to help me understand almost anything to a better degree, even things that aren’t as complex as Shakespeare’s literature. I especially liked the fact that The Merchant of Venice was placed in a more modern setting that was somewhat more relatable to me. Being able to see things played out such as Portia’s gameshow Destiny, Salarino and Solario’s elevator scene, or Shylock and Antonio’s prison trial scene allowed me to say to myself things like “oh, Portia’s way of marriage as stated by her father in his will is almost like a game. There really is no true love as this is just a game and Portia has turned herself into the prize of her own gameshow” and “Act 2 scene 8 actually is just a scene where basically two friends are talking about events that are unfolding.” It was almost as if I was rereading/relearning the play. Of course, the written work and our studies in America helped out from time to time when I didn’t hear a line here and there but really, as the play continued, things that didn’t really come through in the written plays came alive in the performance of the plays. Things like atmosphere, mood, emotion, and tension -- things that couldn’t come alive in a written version of the play -- came alive in the play. Antonio and Shylock’s prison trial scene created huge tension that could almost be felt building in the room; Lady Macbeth’s sleepwalking scene gave me a heightened sense of foreboding that ran chills through me; and Cardenio’s finals scene where Fernando got away scot-free gave me a large sense of disappointment, though I think I probably would have also felt similarly had we studied Cardenio.

Even through all of this – the preparation and the plays – there still were areas that things just didn’t connect. The post-performance discussion connected a large number of those disconnected dots for me and solidified my understanding even more. I feel like our post-performance discussions included a decent amount of clarification points and thus really helped me in this aspect and through this process, I believe I have gained a greater appreciation for Shakespeare and his works of literature.

 

previous   |   back to testimonials   |   next