April 23 is observed as ‘English Langauge Day’ by United Nations. The day is accorded the status for being the day, as many believe, when William Shakespeare was born and died.
I am drawing on my limited knowledge of the Playwright’s life and his works to write this article.
The first time I heard of William Shakespeare, was when I was around 12. I came across a copy of ‘Tales from Shakespeare’, an abridged version of six of Shakespeare’s plays meant for school children. The book had the following stories – The Merchant of Venice, The Tempest, The Taming of the Shrew, King Lear, Julius Caesar, and Macbeth. For a young mind, the stories were captivating and left an indelible mark.
While I shed tears for King Lear, the story that I remembered clearly through years was Merchant of Venice. I am an imaginative reader who imagines the characters and set up in her head and for years I remembered a scene from the play specifically, that of Portia arguing in the court to save Antonio’s life.
I wouldn’t delve into the antisemitic tones of the play. At that age, I was struck by the imagery of a woman saving a man, not a common occurrence in plays written at that time.
Shakespeare’s plays, as you grow up you realize are not free from the prejudices of his time, have universal themes. Some of the speeches given by his characters are evocative and hugely famous.
‘Friends, Romans, Countrymen, Lend Me Your Ears’, who hasn’t come across these words at least once, a famous speech by Mark Antony in the play Julius Caesar. A speech that I had to read about four years later for school curriculum.
Shakespeare remained a part of my life with me reading his plays for my English Literature degree in college and then later I opted to study Shakespeare’s adaptations for my University degree.
Though the language has changed, and centuries have passed, themes that Shakespeare explored in his plays remain universal. There’s no other reason that every few years Bollywood churns an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, a play about star-crossed lovers.
Reading Shakespeare in 21st century is not without its complications. One cannot ignore the sexist, racist, and antisemitic undertones in most of his plays and an analysis of these elements is important to understand the society of the 16th century England.
Remembering William Shakespeare On ‘English Language Day’
The Broken Inkpot 