Hey there, I'm Olivia-Savannah from Olivia's Catastrophe, but today I'm here
on Book Break to react to some of your unpopular
Shakespeare opinions. It's no secret that I love Shakespeare and I'm very much
looking forward to seeing what you guys thought,
and seeing if I agree or politely disagree. I'm going to be using
Macmillan's collectors library editions to help me do so. These are absolutely
beautiful books, I love their covers, I love that we have
golden edged spines, and it's got illustrations inside
which is always nice when you're reading Shakespeare. But let's get into those
unpopular opinions because we've got a lot to talk about. An
unpopular opinion was that Shakespeare wrote most of his plays.
This is a big debate whether Shakespeare didn't write his plays or he did write
his plays, and it's too big to get into now,
but I do think it doesn't really matter. Maybe that's my controversial opinion. I
don't think it matters if Shakespeare wrote most of his plays or he didn't.
I know we see them as all under one author but either which way
we still get the plays, and I feel like the plays are what matter more
than who wrote it. Are people going to come at me for that one?
Someone said his obsession with everyone dying is kind of weird and
I have to agree, but at the same time grief books and sad books
are some of my favourite books, so maybe that's why I love Shakespeare so
much. Jimmy said probably some of the words and phrases Shakespeare
is using were already coined back then but he was the first one to write it
down, and I have to agree. Just because
Shakespeare's plays are things that have survived doesn't mean he's the first one
to say all of this stuff. However we just don't have any evidence
of anything else, we just have to go with it.
I just read one that Shakespeare- that said Shakespeare
was essentially Eastenders for his day.
I agree! It's just as dramatic, there's loads of shouting, if you're watching
adaptions you'll see lots of shouting, oh it's literally Eastenders! Somebody
said that 10 Things I Hate About You is infinitely better than The Taming of
the Shrew, and that is a retelling of The Taming of the Shrew. And I also got a lot
of people saying how much they hate The Taming of the Shrew.
And I absolutely agree. I do not like this play.
I do not think it's a very good one for Shakespeare, I kind of recommend it
to nobody, but the 10 Things I Hate about You, that is a great film.
Somebody said why do we study Shakespeare at school when there are
other authors that we could be studying, and I want to talk a little bit about my
experience studying Shakespeare. So when I was in school the focus was
very much on the language that Shakespeare was using,
and iambic pentameter, and kind of the literary devices he was using.
So for example the sonnets are written really really beautifully, and I think
these would be a good one for when you're trying to look at how he
writes, and the flow of the words, and the rhythm and the rhyme.
However I do think it's great when you look at the themes in Shakespeare's
plays and those are the things that I think really
are what kept Shakespeare alive today, and why his works are still so widely
read. Because a lot of those themes can be
lifted and placed in our contemporary times, and you can see the comparison,
for example Othello is a play about racism, and we still
experience racism here in the present day. And you can look at racism back then
and how the play kind of shows the racism manifesting and
building in some of the characters, and then you can look at the present day and
how racism manifests in our present day. Like
imagine reading Othello alongside The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas.
That could be so interesting. Or reading Macbeth
alongside The Sin-Eater by Megan Campisi. OK somebody said that modern
adaptations and retellings of Shakespeare's works are just as relevant
and important as his original works, and I
agree, because the thing that I take away the most from
Shakespeare's plays are the themes rather than the characters in the
storyline. And the themes are what really relate to the modern day still,
and therefore modern retellings which are taking those
themes and showing how they fit into our present day
is exactly doing the same thing that I do when I read a Shakespeare play. And
therefore I agree they are just as valid. And there are some wonderful ones out
there to be reading as well. Jennifer mentioned reading all of Shakespeare's
plays and not liking any of the works or connecting with any of the characters
or having any of these stories resonate with them, and
that makes me sad, but also I understand. I don't think Shakespeare is for
everyone, just as I don't think one particular
author means that there's always going to be
something from them that you like. It's a give and take.
A Midsummer Night's Dream is kind of boring. That kind of hurts my soul a
little bit I have to admit. I love A Midsummer Night's Dream.
But I also love romance and magic and this book has both of them so
I've got to politely disagree. Jamie says that Love Labor's Lost is the best
Shakespeare play, and I haven't heard that many people talk about it.
I did enjoy it when I read it, it was very dramatic. I wouldn't say it's the
best but it's still very good, and I can see why it's your favourite.
Somebody said that The Taming of the Shrew when genderbent is more meaningful,
and i do think that looking at these plays
genderbent can be very very interesting. I know that there's some productions of
plays where they have an all-male cast or an all-female cast. I do think that
having these plays genderbent can really bring up a lot of different themes and
make you think of them in different ways, especially how
gender impacts the play and the decisions that the actors make.
I also think it's very interesting when we have racial diversity in the play.
I watched a production of Romeo and Juliet where Romeo was Indian
and Juliet was Scottish and it was just very interesting to see
how that also had an impact in the play. And I've also seen Troilus and Cressida
recently where Cressida was Black and I also
thought that was an interesting addition to the play.
So I think that having the racial diversity and having some gender-bent
retellings can really spotlight certain themes and
bring them to the light, and make them even more interesting to read the play
and then to see that type of adaption. Someone said some of his comedies are
extremely unrealistic to the point where they can't get over it.
And I'm gonna hold up much to do about nothing for this one because that's one
of the few comedies of his that I've read,
and I kind of agree, but it's also kind of like when you get those cheesy shows
where you know everything's gonna work out but you still watch it anyway and
enjoy it. Kind of like a rom-com in some aspects.
I have to talk about Romeo & Juliet. A lot of you
overwhelmingly said you didn't like Romeo & Juliet. They are two teenagers who
are spoiled who cause a lot of death and it's not that great of a play. And I
have to say - I agree! I don't think this is my
favorite Shakespeare play. I think what it does
really good is when you adapt it to stage it's actually very enjoyable,
and the language in this one is truly beautiful when you're reading it,
but when I read it I don't love it as much as I do when I watch it on stage.
I do think the characters are not great, the time span is a little bit short
for this one, lots of things about this play don't
necessarily work, so I understand why a lot of people don't like
it, and I understand why a lot of people have read it, because I do think this is
a great place to start with William Shakespeare's works. Just
because it's so easy to read, and it's not that complex, it's got a
wide variety of characters, but not as much as some of the others do.
While it's not the best, it's also the one that I recommend everyone start with.
Especially as most people know the plot so it's easy to get into. Someone just
said Titus Andronicus is better than Romeo & Juliet
and I politely disagree with this. I'm not a huge fan of Titus Andronicus
personally. Also somebody said Romeo and Juliet is not a tragedy, it's satire. I do
believe it can be both, it can be a tragic satire,
but I definitely do agree that Romeo & Juliet
is a satire and it's supposed to have a cautionary message to it.
And lots of times when people study it they forget to emphasize that.
Someone says they think William Shakespeare would love meme culture and
judging from his plays he would absolutely adore meme culture.
People have also mentioned that Shakespeare is overrated, and someone
even said Chaucer deserves more attention than Shakespeare does.
I think Chaucer did a lot of really good things and is definitely underrated
however I do prefer Shakespeare to Chaucer personally,
but I do think they both bring some really good things to the table.
Last but not least I hear people saying they don't like Hamlet and they don't
like Othello which kind of hurts me a little bit, because I absolutely
love Hamlet and Othello. That's a very common opinion
but I think they're both very fantastic, and I like the characters in this. And
usually I'm more here for the themes with Shakespeare, so being able to like
the characters and the themes is a big plus for me. So
thank you so much to Book Break for having me.
I loved all of your unpopular opinions, some are very entertaining, some are very
eye-opening and made me think about my own opinions some more, and yeah I
hope you enjoyed this video. Please let me know in the comment section down
below, do you disagree or agree with me? Or what are some of your Shakespeare
thoughts and feelings? And I hope you have a very good day. Goodbye!