Confessions of a Conservative Atheist
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The British actor and director released his first film, Henry V in 1989, when I was a tender thirteen years old. It passed without notice for me during its theatrical run, but the video rental store, that monument to entertainment, where most families made at least a weekly pilgrimage before the rise of streaming, was… Continue reading How Kenneth Branagh changed a fantasy geek’s life and transformed him into a Shakespeare fanatic
Jaques, As You Like It’s “melancholy fellow,” is not likely to appear on any list of Shakespeare’s greatest characters, nor is his speech on the nature of his melancholy, but we see in him a sort of proto-Hamlet without the need to wound, opinion unrestrained, as he fancies himself said, claims it is better to… Continue reading Shakespeare’s most underrated character and speech, perhaps
Few, if any endings are more tragic, but therein lies Shakespeare’s clever trick. To produce such an effect, he hid a tragedy in what is truly a comedy, the comedy of life itself. Everyone knows Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy because any play that ends with two young lovers, the main characters of… Continue reading Romeo and Juliet and the true nature of tragedy and comedy
Shakespeare isn’t a puzzle box to be unlocked or a cipher to be decrypted. He is instead a universe to be explored and in that regard, no one in history has even come close. Ultimately, your opinion is likely based on your opinion on the purpose of art itself. The 400th anniversary of the publication… Continue reading Shakespeare friends and foes, Falstaff, and the idea of art as a mirror to the soul
King Henry V is a nationalist hero to the English, a villain to the French, and likely something in between to modern audiences. Part heroic warrior, part self-serving, calculating politician, Henry’s rise prompts timeless questions about the nature of power in general. Shakespeare’s Henry V is a subtly yet at times disturbingly contradictory character, a… Continue reading Shakespeare’s Henry V and the timeless politics of power
Confessions of a Conservative Atheist 