atreides:

“Why give you me this shame? Think you I can a resolution fetch From flowery tenderness? If I must die, I will encounter darkness as a bride, And hug it in mine arms.”

— Shakespeare, Measure for Measure, Act III, Scene I 

okay, why did no one tell me that Angelo from Measure for Measure is just Javert with a little more power?

At least in the production I’m watching, he’s really hesitant to even accept the duties and responsibilities as the duke’s deputy, because he hasn’t been tested yet. That’s a line in the script but it could easily be played in an Iago or Edmund way, of saying the exact thing to make people around him believe he’s honorable, but when the chain marking his status is placed around his neck he looks terrified of it and is unwilling to even sit in the duke’s chair at first.

He just cares about enforcing the law and won’t be moved by the argument that he might have been tempted to do the things - he’d prefer to receive the same punishment if it turns out that he’s committed the same crime.

And then when Isabella is first making her plea for him to spare Claudio’s life he sounds so reasonable and almost kind as he explains that he can’t just “punish the fault and not the actor of it,” and he can’t just revoke a sentence that’s already been passed.

and then he has this speech that goes hard and is very Javert

The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept:
Those many had not dared to do that evil,
If the first that did the edict infringe
Had answer’d for his deed: now ‘tis awake
Takes note of what is done; and, like a prophet,
Looks in a glass, that shows what future evils,
Either new, or by remissness new-conceived,
And so in progress to be hatch’d and born,
Are now to have no successive degrees,
But, ere they live, to end.

I’m so mad that I like Angelo so much because I know what he tries to do later, and I was really expecting to hate him on sight.

There Shall Be Order For It

Angelo’s hands keep seeking out the chain of state placed around his neck when he was deputized, and it is with equal parts relief and doubt that he discovers it still there. The metal is so cold it almost burns, but then according to the rumors Angelo himself is so cold and unfeeling that any lightest touch would burn him. The problem is that he’s not at all sure he’s the man for the job.

The law has slumbered until now, and now that it is sensible it looks around hungrily. If it tries to tackle all the problems it faces at once, the licentious rot will swallow it up and make it sick, yet how could it do otherwise? How can Angelo have the self-control to keep a tight rein on everything that might go wrong? As it stands the law is a scarecrow to be mocked, and if he is not careful it will become something far worse: a bogeyman to be resisted. He must be severe, but fair.

He will not be the reason Vienna falls. He will lance the boil swiftly, and they will know he is serious about his office. When he signs the decree to tear down all the bawdy houses, it is the first time he has sat in the duke’s chair and not simply brushed his fingers across its wooden back, the first time he has been a man who can sit in the duke’s chair. But then he sighs and rubs the tension at the back of his neck. It’s not enough. He needs a symbol.

He finds it in an arrest record among the papers he has been unable to examine until now. One Claudio Pellegrini, of very high society, yet not so high that he kept from soiling the virtue of a young woman out of wedlock. It is one thing for a common tradesman to fall, another for a man of a respected and established family. In the eyes of God the sin is the same, and in the eyes of the law the punishment must likewise be the same, but in the eyes of the men watching, it will mean something that even he is given no special treatment. Those who err will face the consequences regardless of status, and for that reason Claudio must die.

                                                  – Shakesphere ~ Measure for Measure

queerpyracy:

what books were you assigned to read in a class that you still hold a violent and bitter grudge against

for me it’s into the wild and the scarlet letter

dduane:

hello-delicious-tea:

bemusedlybespectacled:

realphilosophytube:

maha-pambata-is-my-patronus:

dukeofbookingham:

penfairy:

oh! I have to tell you guys a great story one of my professors told me. So he has a friend who is involved in these Shakespeare outreach programs where they try to bring Shakespeare and live theatre to poor and underprivileged groups and teach them about English literature and performing arts and such. On one of their tours they stopped at a young offenders institute for women and they put on a performance of Romeo and Juliet for a group of 16-17 year old girls. It was all going really well and the girls were enjoying and laughing through the first half - because really, the first half is pretty much a comedy - but as the play went on, things started to get quiet. Real quiet. Then it got up to the suicide scene and mutterings broke out and all the girls were nudging each other and looking distressed, and as this teacher observed them, he realised - they didn’t know how the play ended. These girls had never been exposed to the story of Romeo and Juliet before, something which he thought was impossible given how ubiquitous it is in our culture. I mean, the prologue even gives the ending away, but of course it doesn’t specify exactly howthe whole “take their life” thing goes down, so these poor girls had no idea what to expect and were sitting there clinging to hope that Romeo would maybe sit down for a damn minute instead of murdering Paris and chugging poison - but BAM he died and they all cried out - and then Juliet WOKE UP and they SCREAMED and by the end of the play they were so upset that a brawl nearly broke out, and that’s the story of how Shakespeare nearly started a riot at a juvenile detention centre

Apparently something similar happened during a production of Much Ado at Rikers Island because a bunch of inmates wanted to beat the shit out of Claudio, which is more than fair tbh

honestly Shakespeare would be so pleased to know his plays were nearly starting brawls centuries into the future

I played Claudio once and I fully support this

“When we took Shakespeare’s “Measure for Measure” into a maximum security woman’s prison on the West Side…there’s a scene there where a young woman is told by a very powerful official that “If you sleep with me, I will pardon your brother. And if you don’t sleep with me, I’ll execute him.” And he leaves the stage. And this character, Isabel, turned out to the audience and said: “To whom should I complain?” And a woman in the audience shouted: “The Police!” And then she looked right at that woman and said: “If I did relate this, who would believe me?” And the woman answered back, “No one, girl.” And it was astonishing because not only was it an amazing sense of connection between the audience and the actress, but you also realized that this was a kind of an historical lesson in theater reception. That’s what must have happened at The Globe. These soliloquies were not simply monologues that people spoke, they were call and response to the audience. And you realized that vibrancy, that that sense of connectedness is not only what makes theater great in prisons, it’s what makes theater great, period.”

Oskar Eustis

Love that “No one, girl,” is the same response over 400 years later

This. Anybody who thinks Shakespeare was “really writing for elites” or is “only for rich posh people” needs their head felt.

This makes me crack tf up. Hacker’s just explaining the shit that he stole to make up the transformatron and slider’s just like “does it look like I give a fuck? no bitch”

I mean, who wouldn’t.