Shakespeare is undeniably one of my favorite authors, even though it takes a good deal of concentration to understand what is actually being said, and a good bit of study to really enjoy it. So when I found out that the English class I am interpreting for this year will be studying a few of Shakespeare’s comedies (Twelfth Night and A Midsummer Nights Dream) I was pleased. So far all they have studied is Romeo & Juliet, and Julius Caesar – certainly not the best way to gain an appreciation of one of the world’s greatest playwrights.
In the past teachers have had students read the play in class, had discussions and tests based on the reading, and then had the students watch the play. All set up to ensure that I didn’t have to do much interpreting of the actual plays (thank heavens!). So far it has worked fairly well, and students seem to at least figure out the gist of the story. Also, fortunately for me there have been captioned or subtitled versions of the plays available thus far, even though I have had to purchase the captioned copies and lend them to the school for classroom use.
However, this year fate has caught up with me, and there are no decent captioned film versions of Twelfth Night available, either at the school or for me to purchase. This year, I am going to have to bite the proverbial bullet and do my best to interpret Shakespeare without frying my brain.
Wow. I barely understand parts of Shakespeare as it is, let alone well enough to be able to translate it into another language. Maybe you could just watch the play and write down the script for him to follow along. Or maybe not. But wow, that sounds really hard.
ReplyDeleteyah, ambitious. Wish I knew of a good captioned version for you...
ReplyDeleteThat does sound like a challenge. Good luck!
ReplyDelete