so I talked Craig said come do as TED
talks for my student so I thought why
but I'm a professor I get paid to talk
for 50 minutes how like I know when I
talk for 15 or 18 so I thought I'll give
it a go I said what should I do we said
we'll talk about Shakespeare not that
why Shakespeare why Shakespeare the only
answer I could come up with was to
plagiarize our gorgeous young Prime
Minister and say well it's 2060 that's a
start wrong and it's the easiest one
rent because four hundred years and six
days ago
on April 23rd Shakespeare died Prince
died this week he's had a lot of press
would he still have that Prize four
hundred years from now I don't know will
the BIA press four hundred years from
now probably not what so why why after
400 years in 2012 during the London
Olympics lots of exciting things happen
one of them we probably all remember is
the lightning man and Hussein bold
repeated it again when all those sprint
events hundreds of thousands of people
witnessed something else every Olympics
matches sport with culture and there's
always a cultural olympiad
in 2012 in London they chose Shakespeare
there are over 100 productions between
April the 23rd and the end of the event
in November 70 of those took place in
The Globe Theatre they represented
countries over 40 countries from around
the world and they were in 37 different
languages why most of those countries
have been colonized by the English
having thrown off all the shackles of
colonization why had they kept
Shakespeare and why did they want to
listen to Shakespeare in their own
language and why when they came to
did thousands of people living in London
whose origins were in those countries
come to listen to Shakespeare in the
language into which they had been born
that's what I want to talk to you about
today the power of listening to
Shakespeare that's why I don't want a
text up there because that would
contradict me and that's why I'm glad we
closed that book when Shakespeare is
first performed and for well over 200
years when people wrote about going to
plays when they wrote about going to a
Shakespeare play or any play they would
write in their diary they would write in
their commonplace book last night I went
and I heard Midsummer Night's Dream last
night I went and I heard Hamlet no one
ever wrote until well into the
nineteenth century that they saw a play
because a play is about voice and no one
understood that more than Shakespeare
didn't we are there because it consoles
us to hear a human voice because we want
a voice to make the sounds of joy and
sorrow for others because what matters
in life is what we apprehend what we
seize what seizes us those things that
make us terrified and those things that
make us a joyful and theater brings
those those and Shakespeare no more so
so it's curious tragic just curious that
when students come to me in university
majority of them say who Shakespeare I
don't know so I was so hard in high
school some of them was oh I loved it I
loved it right oh so what do you love
about all the movies there's such great
Shakespeare movies and I have to say
well no no no Shakespeare is not about
watching a movie
there has to be a person there a person
who is enduring the story for us so that
in witnessing it we can be grasped and
grasped in turn the emotions that are
being experienced don't be afraid of
shakespeare and most of my students many
of you I mean one of the reasons I
thought well we'll do things right
because ill Craigs it they'll be over
900 students here and they're all gonna
be doing Shakespeare some point rather
holding their noses or not right and I
said well what do they do
well the usual thing Smith some rights
dream Hamlet but uh Romeo and Juliet
make a bath I thought great well we'll
get there we'll see we'll talk about
some of those right but most of them
probably also use the no fear
Shakespeare Cribs right that translate
Shakespeare into English as if it wasn't
English to begin and the sparks nose
people have made millions of dollars off
the backs of no fear Shakespeare right
not the one we shouldn't have feared
them to begin with him and Shakespeare
never made a penny in his life off of
the printing of his plays he could not
have cared less when the folio came out
seven years after his death it came out
because the surviving partners of his
company wanted to make a memorial he
never cared there were hundreds of
editions of his works he never made a
penny on them because it wasn't about
reading and that's what I want to focus
on now I want to take a couple of scenes
and I want to talk you through them and
I want to try to give you a sense of
what you can a pretend when you look and
listen right and what I'm going to say
to you now and perhaps repeating
concluding because I have no idea where
I'm going
it'll be turned on what we hear when we
listen to these texts don't look for
meaning
there isn't any don't look for
thisis don't hunt themes don't analyze
metaphors don't worry about what you're
going to write your essay about just
listen and open yourself up as you
listen and be very responsive to what
you feel because apprehension is far
more important than comprehension and in
Midsummer Night's Dream one of
Shakespeare's extraordinary figures the
Duke Theseus says precisely that at the
end of the play and he says you know one
of the interesting things about life is
this is that whenever we apprehend an
effect we want to comprehend a cause and
that's a problem especially with theater
and always with life something happens
to us we want to know why what well the
cause does it matter who knows what the
first cause of anything is was it God
the creator or the Big Bang there beyond
my comprehension but in the moment of
life I apprehend constantly what it is
to be living and to seek meaning in that
rather than to simply swim in the
luxuriousness of my own soul and heart
seems like an extraordinary abandonment
but the joy of living so let's look at
Shakespeare we'll go through maybe just
one scene the screen here tells me I've
got nine and a half minutes not to see
what we can do they actually give us
enough for one I'm going to give you a
choice I got a few things on my mind
let's go for two that are big ones out
there if you haven't encountered them
yet you're going to encounter them in
your high school years Romeo and Juliet
Hamlet which one do you want now
I think I I think I think I think Romeo
and Juliet right wrong craic but in red
male character and what okay now if you
if I can stay whoa boy I'm under nine
minutes up so if I can talk like the
bolt man right if we can get through
this scene maybe we do a bit hammock
when we finish with a moment from Hamlet
okay here we go I want we're going to do
with Romeo and Juliet I've got to go to
the scene where we first meet Juliet
because it tells us something about
Shakespeare you know what Shakespeare's
really good at he's great at women he's
great at listening to women and they
can't ask listen to women and there's a
reason for that because in his lifetime
no woman was ever on the stage no woman
ever acted on the English stage until
1665 so men always played the parts of
women and not just boys the remainder of
the companies spent their entire career
aging through female parts so in this
scene we first meet Juliet run we have
Juliet and we have the nurse and we have
Lady Capulet three principal women from
the play what we've not met Juliet yet
it's Act one Scene three but the the
nurses sitting Lady Capulet we've met
and she comes in and says where's my
daughter
we met Lady Capulet in Act one Scene one
when the men were all fighting causing
all that difficulty the Montagues and
the Capulets rustling with one another
men drawing their swords all
demonstrating their masculinity
excruciating ly funny and Lady Canada
let knows that and she mocks her husband
she says to him why bother getting your
sword out old man there's no point what
she's a strong woman run so she comes in
and she says where is my daughter and
the nurse says oh by my head bed in head
these last 12 years she says I I called
her she didn't come so I swear by my
virginity at 12 I've been calling her
out
know where she is and actually gets up
and she says Juliet no no I don't want
that really I don't want anything up
there can we just kill them is it
impossible how do I kill the those
screens great so duh
and she starts calling her Lady Bird
my dear one where are you
in most productions Juliet's on the
balcony or she's not on stage guess the
text says enter Juliet is always in the
original printings they say enter when
the character speaks she's already there
everything the nurse is saying if you
listen is what you do when you're
playing with a small child you must have
all of dumb that or an aunt or an uncle
or parent has done that with you right
Joey Joey where are you joy my goodness
joy when are you going to come my what
am I going to do with you Joe and where
is Joey the whole time right right there
right only behind you and you pretend
you don't see that's where Julie idea is
if we really are listening to what the
nurse is doing there ladybird my dear
one where are you what a lady chat
understanding watching and eventual
Julie says here I am who wants me
playing with the nerves and nurses your
mother and Julie the lady capulet says
to nurse we give us a minute there's
something I need to tell my daughter the
nurse begins to leave and Lady Capulet
says no come back please come back and
what you needs to tell Juliet your
father has decided that you're going to
be married now and you're going to meet
tonight the man you're going to marry
now what's crucial in this scene if we
are listening and looking is what lady
Capulets doing rent because always in
Shakespeare in crucial scenes when he
wants us to listen there's a listener on
stage
and here it's lady capulet front
listening while her daughter plays with
the nurse and then the nurse toasts a
long story a comic story about Juliet
growing up and Juliet's mother listens
know that she's about to tell her
daughter childhood is over what's she
feeling while she's listening what does
any parent feel at that moment
copic Lee in TV ads where you give your
child the keys to the car for the first
time that's a when you leave them at the
University residence when their
probation offer comes and takes them
away whatever the point where you
realize what happened to my child how
did I miss that if we're listening
that's what's happening and that's it
most productions miss that because
people are reading they ignore lady
confidence an extraordinary thing
happens when the nurse is talking
they're trying to figure out how old
Juliet is and her mother says oh you
know I don't think she's 14 yet and
nurses oh no no it'll be two weeks I
remember because my Suzanne my daughter
and her were born at the same time my
Suzanne who God took from me because she
was too good for me the nurses daughter
died in her infancy and Juliet lived the
nurse says that looking at Juliet and
Lady Capulet is looking at Juliet and
two daughters are dead and if we're not
listening we missed that their houses my
Susan died almost 14 years ago a lady
calculators thinking
my child will be lost to me in two weeks
when she marries Paris and where she
goes to live with him and won the child
I remember playing this disappears he's
gone that's the crucial thing about
listening I've got two minutes I'm going
to very quickly tell you something about
Hamlet and then tie this up at the end
of Hamlet but all the swordplay is going
on in the poisoning and a dozen people
are going to be dead on stage and it's
going to be full of spectacle and it
turns into a real guy flick right
there's a chick moment in there that's
powerful and it's about mothers Gertrude
says nothing but three lines the first
of them is Hamlet let me wipe your brow
take my napkin she says and wipe your
brow you look so tired at the beginning
of the play she'd wanted to touch him
and he wouldn't let her touch him he
never lets her touch and play he pulls
away because he's angry at her for
marrying his uncle right Shakespeare
gives her as her second last line let me
wipe thy brow as she takes her
handkerchief and wipes the sweat off her
son's brow just the way your mother even
when you're 62 like me the cold day will
tighten up your jacket or call you at
University and say is it snowing wear
your mittens right when we don't listen
in life we miss the small things in
literature listening is crucial to
getting those things to that's why
Shakespeare matters not because we
should read him but because we should be
listening to him the beginning of Hamlet
there's a man who's all alone on stage
Francesco waiting to be relieved by
Bernardo he can be out there alone as
long as the director wants to leave him
there saying nothing Bernardo comes
and Bernardo says who's there because
it's dark or Francesco says nay
tell me unfold yourself he says open
your house up to me and I say to you
unfold yourself when you read
Shakespeare close the book open yourself
up after II hand and you won't worry
about the meaning unfold listen and
allow life and literature to touch you
thank you