Shakespeare ?= Foreign Language

I can't comment on anything political really, because I just can't follow it sufficiently to make me feel comfortable having too many opinions on the matter... On another note though, I have to finish reading Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing over my first break. It drives me crazy. Why we read Shakespeare in his original language is beyond me. How is it that Theater Appreciation class has temporarily turned into a foreign language class? Yes, Shakespeare is a foreign language. Scenes that should go by quickly take time to understand because of the language. Yeah it was fine for their time, but give them something written by a modern American writer and they would have the same difficult time reading it. It's not that I don't think there's something to be gained from Shakespeare, because I know the power of his play Romeo and Juliet from the modern adaptation of it starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Daines. But it took seeing that several times for it to make total sense since they used the original script. Very moving stories, good writer, but as it is a foreign language I think it should be treated as such. We don't read Latin in English class, do we? Well where do we draw the line? At least I have yet to be required to read Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in their original language. My wife wasn't so lucky in that matter. In her AP high school class, she had to memorize one of the stories, or maybe it was the introduction, in its original Old English. I also thought it was ridiculous back then. Maybe my beard is making me old and grouchy - 'bout time to trim it up!

Ain't Too Happy

I ain't too happy with my literacy narrative, but I don't think I will ever be for any literacy narrative penned in my name. It's just an unnatural topic in a way for me.

Brainstorming a Literacy Narrative

It wasn't a specific a-ha! moment in my life from which my reading and writing world changed forever. There was no box of books in my attic, no prison stories, no specific person who inspired me by example or anti-example... I've probably only finished reading three or four works of fiction in my life. Reading and writing for me has always been a matter of motivation. If there is something I want to read, then I read it. If there is something I want to write then I write it. And so for this, the motivation, there was a turning point... It was a certain video game.