Saturday, January 5, 2013

12 Day of Christmas

Merry Christmas, Day 12!  If you have been using the church's way of reckoning, then tonight is 12th Night, the eve of Epiphany.  I was pleased once to see Shakespear's play Twelfth Night on 12th Night.
By far, however, the most enjoyable production of it that I've seen was in London in September, at the new "Old Vic" on the south bank of the Thames River.
All the characters were played by men as they were in the days of Shakespeare, which added to the hilarity of the play.  Reading Shakespeare's comedies has never been as satisfying for me as reading the tragedies.  The timing of the actors and the stage action add immensely to the comedies.  I think we laughed and smiled during the entire production.
I had been advised to stand during the play in the "pit," a large space in front of the stage, where we could crowd up close to the stage and where we could see the expressions on the actors' faces so well.
The down side of that was tired legs.
Twelfth Night makes no reference to Christmas that I know of.  It doesn't have as many famous quotes as Hamlet or Romeo and Juliet.  Here are two that I liked:
"Be not afraid of greatness: some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them."
"If music be the food of love, play on."
This year I am trying to understand "Beauty Will Save the World."  Shakespeare has added so much beauty to the world and so many words (3,000) and expressions to the English language.  Culture more than politics.

No comments: