Let’s take a break from the Venn diagrams this week, and play a game everyone can enjoy. In fact, lets try to get as many different people involved as possible. Regular visitors, new-comers, lurkers, trolls, spambots – all are welcome to play.

And your response doesn’t need to be any more than a single word. There are only two rules:

1. Your response must rhyme with the word “zoo.”
2. Your response may not end with the same letter as anyone else’s response.

Please limit one response per person.

Enjoy!

One question that kept coming up in the Shakespeare in American Education conference was “Why Shakespeare?”. Why does this one author out of all of the other authors deserve such a place in the canon? Why spend valuable instruction time in school working on Shakespeare? Is Shakespeare useful in teaching other subjects, or is Shakespeare a topic worth studying in its own right?

Can the answer be agreed upon in the same way as “Why arithmetic?” or “Why writing?” pretty much can be? Or is the answer to “Why Shakespeare?” too ineffable to be codified in that way. Can there ever really be an answer? And if there can’t, how can we justify teaching it?

Of course, all of this begs the question, and you may choose instead to answer in the negative. Is Shakespeare’s popularity a result of a social and political construction, and not based on the merit of the work? Is there some grain of truth to the high school student’s suspicion that it’s all just a scam? Is there a more deserving candidate, or is the elevation of a single individual counter-productive to the idea of a canon?

Nevertheless, I ask you…

Why Shakespeare?

The fifth episode of Season Three of Slings & Arrows airs on Sundance tonight at 8pm. It will also be repeated throughout the week.

Use the comments section of this post to discuss the episode. Any comments I may have will be posted in the comments section as well.

You can view the archives to discuss past episodes and seasons. A discussion thread for the final episode of Season 3 will be posted next week, when it airs on Sundance.

WARNING: Comments may contain further discussion of the show, including potential spoilers. Click through only after viewing the episode. Commenters may discuss this episode as freely as they like, though Canadian readers are asked not to post spoilers for any later episodes.

By the way, did you know that I just saw Geraint Wyn Davies (Henry Breedlove from Season Two) play Richard III this past Thursday? That’s hot.

Well, the conference is over and it was fantastic. We focused mostly on pedagogy today, so I felt a lot more in my element. We also talked about the changing nature of the canon. Yesterday we did a lot of 19th century historical analysis of Shakespeare instruction, which was fascinating, but made me feel like I had a lot of catching up to do. (And when I do that catching up, I now know to start here.)

Anyway, I’m still processing it all. I’ll probably blog more on the conference when I return to NYC, but until I get back, please enjoy this video. In line with the theme of the Shakespeare classroom, here are a very young Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie showing us how it’s done:

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

I’m still in DC, having a great time at the conference.  It’s reminding me of something I like to tell my graduate students about education:  We come to school looking for answers, but what we really learn is how to ask good questions.

I came to this conference looking forward to learning a lot, and I have been.  But I find myself left with more new questions than answers to old ones.  And what I’m really coming away with is a bunch of threads that I now have to follow up on.

Wow, that’s so much better.

Well, I’m off to the Shakespeare Teacher conference. I’m very excited about attending, but it means that I may have to step away from the blog for a few days. I’ll post when I can, but I’ll probably be more interested in blogging about the conference than in keeping up with my regular features.

But what if I could leave behind just one post that combines all of my regular features for the week? Why, we’d just have to call that a Shakespeare Teacher Special Feature! Here’s how it breaks down:

• I. Please find below eight brand-new riddles. This should more than satisfy fans of the Thursday Morning Riddle. Each answer will be one word. Please tell us which number you’re solving and your one-word answer.
• II. Once the riddles have been solved, place the eight one-word answers in the Venn Diagram below, using the numbers as guides. This will be your Conundrum. Can you guess the rules? Venn diagram explanation and sample here.
• III. The answer to Circle A (Riddles 1,3,5,7) will be a place. To stand in for the fact vs. fiction Headline Game, can you name three fictional television shows (of at least four seasons each) that are set in this real-life place?
• IV. The answer to Circle B (Riddles 2,3,6,7) will be a question. This is the Question of the Week. Once the games are done, feel free to discuss this question in the comments below. I have already registered my opinion elsewhere on the blog.
• V. The answer to Circle C (Riddles 7,4,6,5) will be a historical person. I was able to link this person to Sir Francis Bacon in four degrees, though that shouldn’t stop you from posting a longer response, or looking for a shorter one. Entries will be accepted until midnight on Thursday, March 22.

Use the comments section below to register any and all answers, discussion, and comments. I won’t be around much the next couple of days to moderate this, so please work together. If someone posts an answer you think is right, go ahead and say so and offer some words of encouragement. Also, feel free to pass this along to anyone you think may be interested. Here is the direct link.

If this is all too overwhelming or confusing, then just enjoy these eight riddles, and I’ll be back soon to talk about something simple, like Shakespeare.

The Riddles:

1. I act Maynard G. Krebs, and I Gilligan feign;
I’m the Mile High hub; leaving on a jet plane;
With the dinosaurs gone, I’m the last to remain;
And peppers, ham, onions, and eggs I contain.

2. I’m a weave, or the shirt type for which it is known;
I’m the college of Thatcher and William Gladstone;
I’m an unabridged lexicon, standing alone;
And I’m also the clay that preserves a fish bone.

3. I was first worn by Chaplin before his divorce;
I’m a race to be run by a three-year-old horse;
When in cars, I’m a wreck; when on skates, I use force;
And the kids on their soap boxes follow my course.

4. I’m the former first lady of all New York State;
A Nobel-winning chemist who won for a date;
A survivor on Lost with too sudden a fate;
And an ex-Cheney aide who is now an inmate.

5. A brigade made of Wolverines served my command,
When the Sioux and Cheyenne boldy tried to expand.
But the Little Big Horn didn’t go quite as planned,
When I stood up to Sitting Bull – that’s my last stand.

6. If you’re bringing me home, it can be quite a slog;
You can link me to Hoffman or to Skip the Dog;
I’m a fried strip of meat from the gut of a hog;
And a regular feature right here on the blog.

7. I am not Robert Browning, but captured his soul;
I am Stanton, and Hurley, and Taylor, and Dole;
Though I lost that which Shakespeare in Love from me stole;
It was won back by Helen for playing my role.

8. Both the lion and lamb are my two weather guides;
I’m the music of Sousa; the steps it provides;
When in basketball, madness; in history, strides;
In the middle, a novel; Beware of the Ides!

Who are we? 

UPDATE: Riddles 1-6 and 8 solved by Andrew.  Riddle 7 solved by DeLisa.  Circles B and C solved by Annalisa.  See comments for all answers. 

Real life or parody? Sometimes, I can’t tell the difference anymore. That’s when it’s time for the Headline Game.

Below are two headlines from CNN.com and two headlines from The Onion. Can you spot which are the real headlines and which are the fakes?

1. Hard-bitten New Yorkers want mugger’s head
2. NHL signs broadcast deal with Food Network
3. Sharpton says he’s not jealous of Obama
4. White House adds eight inches to White House fence

Note: Capitalization on the Onion headlines changed to match the style of CNN.

Answers: Story 1, Story 2, Story 3, Story 4

How did you do?

In a Venn Diagram puzzle, there are three overlapping circles, marked A, B, and C. Each circle has a different rule about who or what can go inside. The challenge is to guess the rule for each circle. You can find a more detailed explanation of Venn Diagram puzzles, along with an example, here.

Last week, Conundrum moved from movies to television. This week, it returns to its roots in legit theatre. Each of the eight titles below refers to a stage play.

Have you figured out one of the rules? Two? All three? Feel free to post whatever you’ve got in the comments below. Just tell us which circle you’re solving, and what the rule is.

As an extra bit of fun, once the puzzle is solved, let’s see if we can add to the list of plays that belong inside Circle B.

Enjoy!

UPDATE: Circle A solved by DeLisa. Circle B solved by Annalisa. See comments for all answers.

I know I’ve been quiet lately, relying mostly on regular features to keep the site active. I’m going to try to post some actual content over the next couple of days, including some theatre reviews of local (NYC) Shakespeare events. In the meantime, allow me to share with you my favorite Shakespeare-related websites. Hey, Charlie, we’re going to Candy Mountain! Candy Mountain, Charlie!

Internet Shakespeare Editions: The site looks simple and elegant, but runs deep. You can actually view screen shots of the different editions of Shakespeare. You can also search a database of performance histories. Lots more here as well.

Mr. William Shakespeare and the Internet: Primarily a portal to other Shakespeare sites, but the original content will make you want to stay for a while, particularly the interactive timeline of important events in Shakespeare’s life.

SCETI: Furness Collection: View a wide range of primary sources of Shakespeare and related subjects. Want to see a facsimile of Pope’s edition of Lear? Erasmus’s Praise of Folly? Or history’s most famous actors’ copies of the Shakespeare plays they performed in? It’s all here.

Shakespeare Resource Center: A site that lives up to its name. Rich with external links and organized by category, this site has enough original content that it will probably have what you’re looking for. But if it doesn’t, it will point you in the right direction.

Please enjoy these sites. And feel free to post some of your own favorites!

If you were a dogged – even obsessed – journalist, driven by a deeply-held passion for the truth, what present-day news story would be consuming your days and keeping you awake nights?