The Stories
Shakespeare’s plays break down into categories of comedy (no one dies, lots of people get married), tragedy (no one gets married, everyone dies) and history (battles, betrayals and inspiring speeches). This year’s plays were the Merchant of Venice (comedy), Romeo & Juliet (tragedy) and Antony & Cleopatra (history). However, the plays don’t always fall into neat categories.
The Merchant of Venice is a dark comedy with themes of religious hatred, law versus mercy, friendship, romance and women disguised as men. The play has more subplots than a soap opera. Its central conflict involves the Jewish moneylender Shylock who seeks retribution against the Christian merchant Antonio for his insults and abuse and for cutting into his business by lending money without interest. The climax of the play is a trial in which Shylock seeks to enforce a contract entitling him to carve off a pound of Antonio’s flesh. For a comedy, this play explores some very dark themes. However, in the end no one dies and three couples (including Shylock’s daughter) get married.
The plot of Romeo & Juliet is very familiar. However, what is compelling for me on seeing it again is the story of Fr. Lawrence. Fr. Lawrence is the Catholic priest who is Romeo & Juliet’s co-conspirator who marries them in secret and then fakes Juliet’s death to keep her from having to marry Count Paris. When everything ends in disaster, the guilt falls on the well-intentioned Fr. Lawrence as heavily as upon Romeo & Juliet’s parents.
Antony & Cleopatra is another tragic love story. Marc Antony was on top of the world as one of the three rulers of the Roman Empire after the death of Julius Caesar. However, his romance with Cleopatra causes him to make one impetuous decision after another until the title characters and a lot of other people are dead.
The stories are also a bit subversive. In Elizabethan England, Jews and Catholics were seriously out of favor. The Jews had been expelled from England in 1290 and being a Catholic was punishable by death.
Although Shakespeare’s treatment of Shylock may seem harsh by today’s standards, it was remarkably sympathetic for his times. While Jews were commonly portrayed as fiends and devils (as in the Jew of Malta, a play which running at the same time), Shakespeare made Shylock more complex. The Christian characters are blatantly abusive toward him, but still seek to borrow money from him. Shylock’s speech containing the lines “If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?” forces the audience to look at the Jewish character as a human being rather than a caricature.
Similarly, Shakespeare makes the Catholic priest, Fr. Lawrence, one of his most sympathetic characters. Some have suspected that Shakespeare himself was Catholic. However, at the time, England had swung violently from Catholic to Protestant to Catholic and back to Protestant with massive loss of life each time. Being Catholic did not just mean that you went to a different church than your neighbor. It meant that you identified with the enemies of England, Catholic France and Spain. It would have been considered treasonous for Shakespeare to show a Catholic favorably in his current time. However, by setting the story in the past, he could get away with it.
The Language
Some of the speeches get a bit long and the language can be somewhat difficult; however, there is no denying that Shakespeare wrote some of the most beautiful and moving words in the English language. Romeo and Juliet contributed such expressions as star-crossed lovers, a rose by any other name and a plague on both your houses. The Merchant of Venice originated a pound of flesh as term for an over-reaching bargain.
The Merchant of Venice has some incredible speeches in it. Shylock’s “I am a Jew” speech is remarkably complex and challenges the audience to see him as an individual. Portia’s “The quality of mercy is not strained” speech focuses on the conflict between law and mercy.
In Romeo & Juliet, Juliet’s “a rose by any other name” speech echoes Shylock in asking whether we are bound by our family or free to act as individuals.
The Theater Experience
There is also something to be said for the theater experience. Although the Winedale barn is hot and the seats are uncomfortable, there is nothing quite like seeing a play up close. A play is more interactive than a mere movie. The players make their entrances and exits through the audience. When Romeo climbs the orchard wall, the actor climbs over a beam in the barn and jumps down into the aisle. When Bassanio solves the riddle of the chests, he runs across the stage, slapping the hands of the audience members in the front row. Occasionally actors will hand props to members of the audience to hold for them. Theater is something which is actively experienced rather than passively watched.
Getting Away
It is also nice just to get away for a little while. Although Round Top, Texas has a population of 77 (at least according to the sign), you can’t go ten yards without finding a bed and breakfast. One of the pleasures for us has been watching two plays on Saturday and then spending the night at a bed and breakfast and returning for the third play on Sunday afternoon. This year we stayed at a farmhouse built in 1852 and enjoyed a leisurely breakfast after sleeping in.
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