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Shakesplish: How We Read Shakespeare's Language by Paula Blank (review)
Theatre History Studies Pub Date : 2020-12-31 , DOI: 10.1353/ths.2020.0026
Eric Thibodeaux-Thompson

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Reviewed by:

  • Shakesplish: How We Read Shakespeare’s Language by Paula Blank
  • Eric Thibodeaux-Thompson
Shakesplish: How We Read Shakespeare’s Language. By Paula Blank. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2018. Pp. xii + 213. $80.00, cloth.

Paula Blank’s work is timely, and she is dearly missed by many colleagues, friends, and family members. In fact, after Professor Blank’s passing in 2016, so many people were moved by her work that the author’s manuscript was shaped into this 2018 publication.

In the spirit of “Spanglish,” Paula Blank coined the term “Shakesplish” to account for the way we may occasionally experience Shakespeare’s language as a hybrid English. As modern English readers, speakers, and listeners, at first we invariably understand some, but not all, of Shakespeare’s Early Modern English. Blank informs us that there can be great value in what we don’t understand, or as she puts it, “We might discover that ‘Shakesplish’ may be composed of errors in comprehension, but that such errors enable, rather than hinder, some of the pleasures we take in Shakespeare’s language today” (xii).

Blank’s book is arranged in chapters according to how we often perceive Shakespeare’s language—as “Beautiful,” “Sexy,” “Funny,” and “Smart” and book-ended with “Shakespeare in Modern English” at the beginning and “Shakespeare as Modern English” at the end. Blank’s book is full of exhaustive, pains-taking, and impressive examinations of what words and expressions meant in Shakespeare’s time compared to the words and expressions that are closest to those in today’s world.

Yet amid Blank’s formidable research on two areas of conflict—Early Modern English words compared to our Modern English words and what characters are saying compared to what we think they’re saying—are acknowledgments that traditional scholars and practitioners can all get behind. In her first chapter regarding “Shakespeare in Modern English,” Blank writes, “Speaking Shakespeare leads us to the sources of our own power because we find a language which expresses the depth of our experience more fully, more richly, more completely than our own words can” (11–12).

The author makes clear in her second chapter, “Beautiful,” that as we appreciate the occasional difference between what Shakespeare’s characters are saying and what we think they’re saying, we get a deeper understanding of how we experience Shakespeare’s language. Shakesplish is what we think Hamlet is considering, why we think Falstaff is funny, and how we admire Henry V to some extent. Shakesplish involves what we bring to Shakespeare as much as what Shakespeare brings to us. Rather than being preoccupied with what’s “right” [End Page 268] and “wrong” in someone’s understanding of a scene, the author encourages us to embrace what seems to be happening in a scene or within a Shakespearean character, as well. Of course, we need to be accurate about what’s taking place in a scene, but by not dismissing all of the interpretive errors, we can better prepare our productions of Shakespeare. Blank explains: “My focus, here, will be on English that has become strange over time. Shakespeare’s ‘alienation effects,’ moreover, sometimes draw us closer to the plays, rather than distancing us from them, even when we aren’t entirely sure we get what his characters are saying. As Nehamas writes, ‘The art we love is art we don’t yet fully understand. . . . Beauty always remains a bit of a mystery . . . more like something calling me without showing exactly what it is calling me to.’ Shakespeare’s unusual language can produce, in an important turn of phrase by scholar Ruth Morse, ‘alienation effects which do not alienate.’ It somehow invites us in” (33).

In chapter 3, “Sexy,” Blank reminds us that the word “sexy” didn’t come into use until the end of the nineteenth century (93). Nevertheless, modern audiences enjoy any hint of sex in the plays, which often takes the form of characters expressing their desire for sex more than the act itself (93). With “Funny,” Blank’s fourth chapter, the reader will again, no doubt, smile and nod in agreement with the author’s assertion that we sometimes react before we...



中文翻译:

莎士比亚:我们如何阅读莎士比亚的语言(Paula Blank)(评论)

代替摘要,这里是内容的简要摘录:

审核人:

  • 莎士比亚:我们如何阅读莎士比亚的语言,宝拉·布兰克(Paula Blank)
  • 埃里克·锡伯杜克斯·汤普森
莎士比亚:我们如何阅读莎士比亚的语言。宝拉·布兰克(Paula Blank)。加州斯坦福:斯坦福大学出版社,2018年。xii +213。$ 80.00,布。

宝拉·布兰克(Paula Blank)的工作很及时,许多同事,朋友和家人非常想念她。实际上,在布兰克教授于2016年去世后,她的作品感动了很多人,以至于作者的手稿被塑造成了2018年的这本出版物。

秉承“西班牙语”的精神,宝拉·布兰克(Paula Blank)创造了“莎士比亚”一词,以解释我们偶尔会以混合英语体验莎士比亚语言的方式。作为现代英语的读者,演讲者和听众,首先,我们总是了解莎士比亚的《早期现代英语》,但并非全部。布兰克告诉我们,我们不了解的事物可能会具有很大的价值,或者如她所说,“我们可能会发现,'莎士比亚式'可能是由理解错误组成的,但这种错误使而不是阻碍了某些理解。今天我们在莎士比亚的语言中获得的乐趣”(xii)。

根据我们经常将莎士比亚的语言理解为“美丽”,“性感”,“滑稽”和“聪明”的语言,按章节对布兰克的书进行编排,并以书末开头的“莎士比亚现代英语”和“莎士比亚为最后是“现代英语”。布兰克的书充满了详尽,艰辛和令人印象深刻的考察,与莎士比亚时代中最接近当今世界的单词和表达相比,单词和表达的含义是什么。

然而,在布兰克(Blank)对两个冲突领域的强大研究中,即早期的现代英语单词与我们的现代英语单词相比,以及字符在说什么与我们认为的人们说的话相比,都认可了传统学者和实践者都可以落后。布莱克在有关“现代英语中的莎士比亚”的第一章中写道:“说莎士比亚使我们找到了自己的力量之源,因为我们发现一种比我们自己的语言更全面,更丰富,更完整地表达我们经验的深度的语言可以”(11–12)。

作者在她的第二章“美丽”中明确指出,当我们欣赏莎士比亚人物所说的与我们认为他们所说的之间的偶然差异时,我们对莎士比亚的语言体验有了更深入的了解。莎士比亚是我们认为哈姆雷特正在考虑的事情,为什么我们认为福斯塔夫很有趣,以及我们如何在某种程度上欣赏亨利五世。莎士比亚与莎士比亚为我们带来的东西一样多。与其关注某人对场景的理解中的“正确” [End Page 268]和“错误”,不如作者鼓励我们接受似乎是什么。也要发生在场景或莎士比亚角色中。当然,我们需要对场景中发生的事情保持准确,但是通过不消除所有解释性错误,我们可以更好地准备莎士比亚的作品。Blank解释说:“在这里,我的重点将是随着时间的流逝变得陌生的英语。而且,莎士比亚的“异化效应”有时使我们更接近剧本,而不是使我们与剧本疏远,即使我们不能完全确定我们能理解他的角色在说什么。正如内哈马斯(Nehamas)写道:“我们热爱的艺术是我们尚未完全了解的艺术。。。。美总是有点神秘。。。更像是在打电话给我,却没有确切说明它在呼唤我。莎士比亚的非同寻常的语言会在学者露丝·莫尔斯(Ruth Morse)的重要一句话中产生 “不会疏远的疏远效应。” 它以某种方式邀请我们加入”(33)。

在第3章“性感”中,布兰克提醒我们,直到19世纪末(93)才使用“性感”一词。尽管如此,现代观众还是喜欢戏剧中的性暗示,这通常表现为比性行为本身更能表达对性的渴望的角色(93)。毫无疑问,在布兰克的第四章《有趣》中,读者会再次微笑并点头同意作者的断言,即我们有时会在我们做出反应之前...

更新日期:2020-12-31
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