User:HamYoyo/Articles
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b==King Lear==
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Noteworthy Innovations
Confusing Opening
The modern reader of King Lear could benefit from the demystification of some subtlties in the text, as Shakespeare often brushes over details that are made clearer in his sources. This is where a few of the incongruous elements of the plot can be explained.
Scene one features King Lear testing the extent of his daughters' loyalty and love for him. He is preparing to abdicate. Lacking male heir, he decides to divide his land between the sisters and, for two of them, their husbands. He devises a test for them, asking "Which of you shall we say doth love us most?" (Act I scene i line 50) This may strike us as somewhat senile, because if he has already made up his mind as to how the land is shared, the trial appears pointless. Shakespeare has overlooked (purposely or absent mindedly) the crux of the situation, which is that in another version (The True Chronicle History of King Lear - anonymous) Cordelia has already vowed to marry for love, not whomsoever her father should choose. Lear assumes that his youngest daughter will play along with his game. On receiving her proclamations of devout love and loyalty, he plans to force her into a marriage which she couldn't possibly object to after claiming such stolid obedience. Of course, the trap fails disastrously for all parties.
Tragic Ending
The adaptations that William Shakespeare made to the legend of King Lear to produce his tragic version are quite telling of the effect they would have had on his contemporary audience. The story of King Lear (or Leir) was familiar to the average Elizabethan theatre goer (as were many of Shakespeare's sources) and any discrepancies between versions would have been immediately apparent.
Shakespeare's tragic conclusion gains its sting from such a discrepancy. The traditional legend and all adaptations preceding Shakespeare's have it that after Lear is restored to the throne, he remains there until "made ripe for death" (Edmund Spencer). Cordelia, her sisters also deceased, takes the throne as rightful heir, but after a few years is overthrown and imprisoned by nephews, leading to her suicide.
Shakespeare shocks his audience by bringing the worn and haggard Lear onto the stage, carrying his dead youngest daughter. He taunts them with the possibility that she may live yet with Lear saying, "This feather stirs; she lives!" (Act V, scene iii, line 265). We then have the most devestating line ever written by The Bard: "Never, never, never, never, never!" (Act V, scene iii, line 308)
This was indeed too bleak for some to take, even many years later. Samuel Johnson wrote in his The Plays of William Shakespeare (1765) that, "Cordelia, from the time of Tate, has always retired with victory and felicity. And, if my sensations could add anything to the general suffrage, I might relate , that I was many years ago shocked by Cordelia's death, that I know not whether I ever endured to read again the last scenes of the play till I undertook to revise them as an editor." Later yet, Charles Lamb wrote, "To see Lear acted, to see an old man tottering about the stage with a walking stick, turned out of doors by his daughters in a rainy night, has nothing in it but what is painful and disgusting."
--[[User:HamYoyo|HamYoyo (Talk)]] 18:40, Jun 1, 2004 (UTC)
The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess of Malfi (1614/21) is one of John Webster's two great tragedies (the earlier one being The White Devel). Based on an Italian novella, it tells the story of the eponymous duchess who secretly marries her steward, Antonio. This goes against the commands of her brothers who would have her die a widow in order to keep her nobile blood and share of the inheritence within the family name. Written
TBC
bob hund
bob hund is a six-piece rock band from Sweden. The Swedish for "bob the dog", their name was borrowed from a television cartoon character. Their music, hard to classify, is a frantic celebration of the power of music to invigorate and give life.
The band started in autumn 1991 and the group as it is known today was formed within about half a year. Rehearsing hard and performing at every opportunity, by now they've played live over 300 times all over Scandinavia, most notably at the Roskilde, Hultsfred, Ruisrock and Quart festivals.
Bergman Rock is the band's English language side-project, which has recently released its first self titled album.
Selected Discography
- bob hund (1) (1993)
- bob hund (2) (1994)
- Omslag: Martin Kann (1996)
- Jag rear ut min själ! Allt skall bort!!! (1998)
- bob hund sover aldrig (1999)
- Stenåldern kan börja (2001)
- Ingenting (2002)
- 10 år bakåt & 100 år framåt (2002)
Awards
- 1994 - Swedish Grammy "Best Live Band"
- 1996 - Swedish Grammy "Best Lyrics"
- 1999 - Guldägget (The Golden Egg) for "Best Packaging" on Jag rear ut min själ! Allt skall bort!!!
External Links
- bobhund.com (http://www.bobhund.com) - Official site (in Swedish)
- bob hund in English (http://hem.bredband.net/robcum/Musik/Bobhund/) - English translations of song lyrics
- Traestockfestivalen - bob hund (http://hem.bredband.net/robcum/Musik/Traestock/bobhund.html) - a review of bob hund's performance at the Trästock Festival in 1996
- Silence (http://www.silence.se/) - Silence Records, home of bob hund
- THE OFFICIAL WEBSITE OF BERGMAN ROCK (http://www.bergmanrock.com/) - bob hund's English language side-project
- Guldägget (http://www.guldagget.se/) - Home page of The Golden Egg Awards
--[[User:HamYoyo|HamYoyo (Talk)]] 12:31, Jun 2, 2004 (UTC)
next project
I know it feels like you can't, but you'll just have to wait.