Episode Transcript
[00:00:04] Speaker A: Welcome back to another episode of Sort of Sophisticated, the podcast where culture, curiosity, and chaos collide.
They actually collide. They coalesce. They come together, people. That is what's happening on Sort of Sophisticated. We do and say random stuff, but then, like, we learn a lot of stuff and we have fun doing it. Usually there's a drink or two involved. It's kind of awesome. I'm your host, Pete, and back at it with me again is Amanda. How are you doing, Amanda?
[00:00:31] Speaker B: I'm well. How are you?
[00:00:32] Speaker A: I'm doing well.
[00:00:33] Speaker B: Good.
[00:00:34] Speaker A: Little bit tired. Not gonna lie.
It is past my bedtime.
[00:00:37] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:00:37] Speaker A: 3:00pm wow, you had to say that out loud to people. They could have thought it was, like, 10pm in the studio.
Whatever.
[00:00:46] Speaker B: What are we talking about today?
[00:00:48] Speaker A: We are talking about something excellent, actually. This is a I have to thank you episode. Cause for what? Because you gave me the idea. It was like, I don't know, like a month or two ago. Something came up in one of our episodes, and you were Shakespeare.
[00:01:00] Speaker B: What? Huh? Oh, I mean, that's, like, every episode. I don't know anything.
[00:01:03] Speaker A: Well, whatever I, like, wrote down, here we are, like, Shakespeare, we're gonna do this.
[00:01:06] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:01:07] Speaker A: So I wrote it down, but not, like, in some dumb, like, weird way or anything. I got a cool app planned. Like, it's gonna be different. It's gonna be different.
[00:01:13] Speaker B: I'm here for it. Let's go.
[00:01:14] Speaker A: Okay. So this week, the Oscars are coming up. We did one last year, I think, on the Oscars. I think I did.
[00:01:19] Speaker B: Was it a year ago that we did the Oscars?
[00:01:21] Speaker A: Unveiling the Oscars or whatever. Anyway.
[00:01:23] Speaker B: Wow, that seems like it was just like yesterday, but also yesterday.
[00:01:26] Speaker A: Oh, my. What?
[00:01:28] Speaker B: I don't know. I watched the Grammys because there's an episode on the Grammys, and I hated it. Anyways, continue.
[00:01:32] Speaker A: But we're allowed to. That's the whole point of this. Just like. At least you did it. At least you guys.
[00:01:36] Speaker B: Okay, okay, okay.
[00:01:37] Speaker A: So Shakespeare. Why I'm doing the whole thing. So Hamnet. H A M N E T. Hamnet. Right. Shakespeare's son. That's his name. There's a movie that came out. Yes.
[00:01:45] Speaker B: No.
[00:01:46] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:01:46] Speaker B: What?
[00:01:46] Speaker A: It's up for 8 Academy. Awesome.
[00:01:47] Speaker B: Shakespeare's son was actually named Hamnet.
[00:01:49] Speaker A: Hamnet.
[00:01:50] Speaker B: No. You're lying.
[00:01:51] Speaker A: No. And it's.
[00:01:51] Speaker B: This is real.
[00:01:52] Speaker A: Yeah, well, real life. Yes, it's real life.
Because Hamnet and Hamlet are interchangeable back in the 1500s. They are. That's the same name. It's Like Luke and Lucas. Yes. So anyway, his name was Hamnet. He died when he was 11 years old. Spoiler alert.
The point is, I watched this whole movie recently, and it was excellent. It's up for, like, Best Picture. Whatever. I loved it.
[00:02:10] Speaker B: Oh, I feel so interested.
[00:02:12] Speaker A: So I thought, you know what? You said Shakespeare a few weeks ago.
[00:02:14] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:02:15] Speaker A: I watched this movie. I'm like, we're gonna do this.
[00:02:18] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:02:18] Speaker A: Here we are.
But my twist on this whole thing is I don't want to do a boring Shakespeare lecture. Like, oh, these were his best plays. And this is blah, blah, blah, blah. So our title is Shakespeare Twist. He didn't just write literature, he hacked human nature.
[00:02:35] Speaker B: What?
[00:02:36] Speaker A: So we're going to twist. I'm going to give you a twist. I'm going to give you three or four twists as we go. Yeah, yeah, this is going to be good.
No, it's not.
[00:02:42] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:02:43] Speaker A: It's just not what we learned in school, that's all.
[00:02:44] Speaker B: Ooh, I like that.
[00:02:45] Speaker A: Yes. I'm on board. Cause the whole idea of this is, like, to learn.
[00:02:48] Speaker B: Like, learn without.
[00:02:51] Speaker A: Make it sound like we're not doing homework.
[00:02:52] Speaker B: Right. Here we go.
[00:02:53] Speaker A: Because I'm gonna argue, Shakespeare was basically the quote, blueprint for everything we read, write, watch, stream.
[00:03:02] Speaker B: Like, strong commitment right now.
[00:03:04] Speaker A: I'm saying it. Okay, I'm saying it. Jaws was the summer blockbuster. Sort of like, blueprint. Shakespeare was the blueprint for it all, for everything.
[00:03:12] Speaker B: So you're trying to tell me the
[00:03:14] Speaker A: OG Screenwriter, he was totally the OG Screenwriter. He was. Absolutely.
Maybe Plato, maybe Aristotle, I don't know. But Shakespeare is one of them.
[00:03:22] Speaker B: Okay, this seems really stupid, but.
No, no, this just seems stupid to ask, but, like, how is learning about Shakespeare gonna make us cultured and curious? Peter.
[00:03:30] Speaker A: I mean, but obviously I thought she'd never ask. Amanda.
So here's the thing. So this is another one of those pattern episodes. I mean, I know, like, knowing some Shakespeare and all this stuff, like, can make you flex on all your friends and everything. I get that. But bigger than that, it's the characters that he wrote about and, like, how we can recognize what was inside their motivations.
[00:03:50] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:03:51] Speaker A: Like. And how we can see that in people today. So, like, a few episodes ago, we did.
[00:03:55] Speaker B: You're talking about, like, the patterns that he had with human emotion and blah, blah, blah.
[00:03:59] Speaker A: Yeah. So I don't. I won't use the word pattern because I use that a lot. How we can better recognize human behavior and know how to adjust and how we can recognize our own behavior.
We have to thank Shakespeare for. So that's how it's going to make us cultured and curious.
[00:04:11] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:04:11] Speaker A: Got it. That's what we're learning more self awareness. Shit. That's the whole point.
[00:04:14] Speaker B: What's our wow word here?
[00:04:16] Speaker A: It is. Our word of the week this week is liminal. Yes. L, I M I N A L. Liminal.
[00:04:22] Speaker B: Liminal. What do you got something to do with limit?
[00:04:25] Speaker A: Limit?
Limit?
[00:04:27] Speaker B: Nope.
[00:04:27] Speaker A: Maybe. Maybe a little bit, actually. Okay.
[00:04:30] Speaker B: Lumina. No, no, I give up.
[00:04:31] Speaker A: You give up? Okay officially means in between.
So, I mean, if you have limits, maybe it's in between, the limit. I don't know. Yeah, like a transition, but not like physically, like existential.
Okay. It comes from the Latin root word lyman or limen, meaning threshold. So literally, like standing in a threshold, like in a doorway, but a proverbial door.
[00:04:50] Speaker B: Oh, okay.
[00:04:50] Speaker A: You get the idea, right?
[00:04:51] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:04:51] Speaker A: Yeah. So like, maybe graduating from high school and going to college, the summer between high school and college, existentially in between, that's liminal. Yes. Okay. So we have those moments in our life. That's how you gotta work it in.
[00:05:04] Speaker B: So fascinating. All these, like, words that I've never even knew existed.
[00:05:08] Speaker A: This is wonderful. This is what we do this for if our episodes suck. Amanda. Just so long as our words of the week are strong, we're on to something.
[00:05:16] Speaker B: We have to use them. Use them.
[00:05:18] Speaker A: Oh, shit. But before we start, dude, shout out to everybody. SOS army, hit send. Share with your friends. Do whatever you got to do. I got to bring this up earlier each episode, right? We got to get the word out.
[00:05:29] Speaker B: It's really because we're in a liminal space right now.
[00:05:34] Speaker A: That was very good. We are. We're in a liminal space. If you would like. If you DM us, we would happily send you the word of the week with its etymology and definition and how to use it in a sentence so you could flex on all your friends. How do you like that, people? Liminal. Okay, let's go.
[00:05:48] Speaker B: All right, so where are we starting? History.
Shakespeare was born in a little cottage.
[00:05:53] Speaker A: So sort of like, I'm not. I promised I wouldn't bore you with history.
[00:05:57] Speaker B: I'm sure there'll be a little bit.
[00:05:58] Speaker A: Can I do that thing? I haven't done it in a while, where it's like Shakespeare shot out of his mom's vagina.
[00:06:02] Speaker B: No, stop it. Okay, no, no.
[00:06:04] Speaker A: All right, fine. But I do have to do a little bit of history, just so everybody like. But I'll go really, really fast, and I'll do like textbook history.
[00:06:10] Speaker B: Whiplash history.
[00:06:11] Speaker A: Let's go. Yes. Okay. Did you say whiplash history? Yeah. All right, we're going to do this. So William Shakespeare was born in 1564 in Stratford upon Avon, England, which is 100 miles Stratford upon Avon, stratified.
I already screwed up twice. Okay. Can't even do it 100 miles outside of London. He wasn't rich or born into wealth. Right. Didn't go to college, didn't go to university, as they call it over in England. He moved to London sometime in his 20s, became an actor.
Actually, a shareholder in a theater company called Lord Chamberlain's Men. How do you like that for a fun fact? Right out the bin.
[00:06:44] Speaker B: I mean, makes more sense as to why he wrote what he wrote and how it became so popular.
[00:06:49] Speaker A: Very popular. Very. Between the late 1500s and the early 1600s, he wrote 39 plays and 150 sonnets. Comedies, histories, tragedies.
[00:06:59] Speaker B: All the things I felt under accomplished. Continue.
[00:07:01] Speaker A: I know, it's incredible.
[00:07:02] Speaker B: I don't know. This is very depressing. Now, keep going.
[00:07:03] Speaker A: And he did all this, mind you, while he was running that entertainment business in England.
[00:07:08] Speaker B: But he must have died early. Like, I feel like all these years.
[00:07:10] Speaker A: He died when he was 52 years old. He did not die early. No, he lived like a long, normal life. And 52 at that time was kind of old.
[00:07:17] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:07:17] Speaker A: No, no, no.
[00:07:18] Speaker B: Yeah, 1564.
[00:07:19] Speaker A: And FYI, remember how we always say, like, oh, they, like, all these old people have to be dad to get famous.
[00:07:25] Speaker B: Okay, yes.
[00:07:26] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:07:26] Speaker B: No, he was famous during his time.
[00:07:27] Speaker A: Oh, he got famous during his time. Oh, no, he was a bad.
[00:07:29] Speaker B: Did he have kids?
[00:07:30] Speaker A: He did. He had three kids.
[00:07:31] Speaker B: Did he get married?
[00:07:32] Speaker A: This is the whole. Yes. To Anne. Okay, so we'll go fast. So he married anne. He was 18 years old. And Agnes in the movie. Because I watched the movie. So Agnes and Anne are also the same name back in, like, the late 1500s. Okay, yeah. Because that threw me off, too. So in the movie, her name's Agnes, but her name, like when I learned it in history, is Anne Hathaway. So Anyway, he was 18.
[00:07:52] Speaker B: He was married to Anne Hathaway.
[00:07:53] Speaker A: Yeah, the OG Anne Hathaway. He was the OG screenwriter. She was. Yes. Okay.
He was 18 years old, she was 26.
He got her preggo and then decided to, of course, marry her. And so they had their first daughter, Susannah, and then two years later, they had twins, Judith and Hamnet. Yes, I'm saying that right. H A M N E T. Judith And Hamnet. And then, spoiler alert, I told you earlier, Hamnet dies when he's 11 years old from, like, the plague or something. So the movie is actually based on that story. It's not based on any of his plays.
[00:08:26] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:08:27] Speaker A: It's based on his life with his wife and when Hamnet dies. And sort of how they manage that. And subsequently his writings are after how Hamlet, specifically the play Hamlet, was, like, derived from that experience. It's not the same at all. It's not like the play has nothing to do with it, but the grief has everything to do.
So, anyway, enough. All the history stuff. So now I'm ready to go. Now we're going to do the.
[00:08:53] Speaker B: What I didn't learn in school and what I learned. Yes, well, what would have made it interesting, it piqued my attention.
[00:08:58] Speaker A: You ready for the first twist?
[00:08:59] Speaker B: Okay, go.
[00:08:59] Speaker A: I said it was going to be twist. Shakespeare twist number one. You know how, like, I always thought when we were in high school or whatever, he was writing for sophisticated people. That was the thought, right? Like, oh, he's so sophisticated. Yeah. No, wrong. He didn't. So he.
Because they were using words like thou and hath and wherefore.
[00:09:18] Speaker B: That was part of the language.
[00:09:19] Speaker A: Thank you. So it was all part of the language. Absolutely right. So he was writing for, like, the common folk. So at the Globe Theater, where he performed all his plays. Another fun fact. The Globe Theater. He helped build the Globe Theater that he was part of a shareholder in that company with Lord Chamberlain's men. Yeah. So he was also, like, a construction worker. He physically helped build the damn theater, which I think is totally cool. But anyway, the point is, plays back then weren't like plays today. Like, today we go to the play, we go to Segerstrom center, or we go to Broadway. We dress up a little bit, we try to be sophisticated, we have a glass of wine, we shut off our cell phones, all that kind of shit. Back then, like, the crowds would rush in. There was. It was all. The bottom was just an arena. It was just standing room only. You would just rush in. And then the sides had, like, where the aristocrats, like, stayed and everything. But for the most part, he was writing to the common folk because it was more like. Think of, like. Do you remember the gladiator fights in Rome? The Coliseum? Like. Like, they were yelling and screaming and throwing shit on the stage. So he. The whole idea is he had to hook them and write to them. His jokes, if they understood them, great. He was writing to them to keep it Fresh. But a lot of times, because they were uneducated, the more sophisticated aristocrats understood them better. But that's not who he was really writing to. He was just writing to hook a really boisterous audience. I never knew that. I mean, I don't know why our teachers didn't. If they would have explained all that, it would have been, like, a lot. I would have been more interested.
[00:10:47] Speaker B: Yeah, but if you know that, then I think when you're reading his works, it means something different. Right? Or maybe you look at it again. Different lens.
[00:10:54] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:10:55] Speaker B: All about context.
[00:10:56] Speaker A: I even thought back to, like. Cause I was watching Hamnet, and there's the monologue. Cause at the end of the movie, spoiler alert. The play Hamlet is actually going on during the movie. And even the monologues. I used to think Shakespeare was so fucking boring with the monologues. Once you see the context of the people that are watching and the way that the actor is expressing himself to the audience, it makes all the sense in the world. Cause those monologues are getting you in the heads of the character. Oh, my God. So, like, I'm telling you, this is the way I wish I would have learned Shakespeare from the beginning. And I'm mad at all of my high school freaking English teachers. Cause they didn't explain any of this stuff to me at all.
So now, like, the whole comedy tragedy thing makes, like, a ton more sense to me because it's just easy for people to grab ahold of. They want comedy, they want murders, they want prostitutes. They want everything. They want rape. Like, they want all the things.
[00:11:51] Speaker B: I mean, I feel like maybe this is why they want all of it.
[00:11:54] Speaker A: Power, blood, debauchery. Right? That's what they want. They want debauchery.
[00:11:57] Speaker B: Which is why you would have been way more hooked in high school if they taught it.
[00:12:00] Speaker A: Absolutely. But, my God, all the guys would have been getting A's. All the girls would have been like. But also then, like, will you be my study partner? Okay, Sorry.
[00:12:06] Speaker B: But if you think about it, it's also, like, very Edgar Allan Poe is right. Like, with all the tragedy and all the.
[00:12:11] Speaker A: But he was really, really dark. But yes. So he did Shakespeare. Did both. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, are you ready for my next twist?
[00:12:17] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:12:17] Speaker A: Okay. Did you, like first twist?
[00:12:18] Speaker B: Yeah, it was good.
[00:12:19] Speaker A: Okay, second twist.
So I always thought Shakespeare invented all of his plays. They were original stories.
[00:12:27] Speaker B: No, I would assume it's. Nothing's original.
[00:12:30] Speaker A: Okay. I thought they were like, Romeo and Juliet. I thought, like, he penned it out. Yeah. Okay.
[00:12:34] Speaker B: So wasn't that, like, a folklore?
[00:12:35] Speaker A: All of them existed before. Yeah.
[00:12:37] Speaker B: Okay. It's kind of like Disney reappropriating all of them.
[00:12:39] Speaker A: All of them? Hamlet, Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, King Lear. I had no idea. That's incredible to me.
[00:12:45] Speaker B: So, I mean, I don't think I realized it was all of them. That seems like a lot.
[00:12:49] Speaker A: Yeah. Every one of them was hijacked from an older version of a story.
[00:12:52] Speaker B: But do you know from where these stories originated?
[00:12:53] Speaker A: I know a few, because I just looked at them real quick. But no, like that one.
[00:12:55] Speaker B: That's interesting to me.
[00:12:56] Speaker A: Yeah. Romeo and Juliet was some older version of an Italian guy named Matteo Bandello who wrote a similar story a hundred years before him. So, like, I guess in the late
[00:13:06] Speaker B: 1400s, he probably heard it somewhere.
[00:13:08] Speaker A: Go. Matteo Bandello. Hamlet came from an old Scandinavian story that actually traces back even farther to a Dutch historian in the 1200s named Saxo Grammaticus.
[00:13:20] Speaker B: And then he took his emotion from the death of his son to enhance that story.
[00:13:23] Speaker A: So that's theoretical, but, yes, fascinating. Yes, yes, yes, yes.
[00:13:26] Speaker B: Okay, okay.
[00:13:27] Speaker A: Macbeth was from a Scottish story. I don't remember, but yes, an old Scottish story.
[00:13:31] Speaker B: You know what's also fascinating, though, if you think about it? He was in London. And so here are these stories that have been passed down from, like, Scandinavia and Italy and Scotland.
Yeah. Like, and just landed somewhere in London. He overheard them, figured them out, read about it. Who knows? And then he hijacks it.
[00:13:49] Speaker A: Right. So can I now also be mad at my 10th grade English teacher again? Because if I would have known, everyone
[00:13:55] Speaker B: says that he's, like, this genius.
[00:13:57] Speaker A: I want to know where all this stuff come from. Like, let me know. He's human, dude. And I'm more interested. Right. So, like, I will say this, though. The one thing that he did do that was, like, way better than all the other ones was he invented the storytelling engine. Right. He did the episode on storytelling. He was able to take the story that existed for 300 or 500 years
[00:14:18] Speaker B: or more and make it interesting. I get it.
[00:14:19] Speaker A: And make it incredible.
[00:14:20] Speaker B: He definitely gets credit a lot.
Absolutely.
[00:14:23] Speaker A: Because we always talk. Remember on our toasting episode, we were talking about, if you can't hook somebody, then how good is the story to begin with? What's the point of it? So the fact that he brought this story to now billions of people, and they probably would have been lost to history, these stories. So you do have to give Shakespeare the credit for being able to do that.
[00:14:43] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:14:43] Speaker A: And that is Monster. Like crazy, crazy monster. Because his ability to develop the character arc like to the nth degree is what made him amazing. Jane Austen, I think we talked about it. The whole idea of getting in the minds of these crazy ass characters. We want to know what the characters are thinking because we relate to the character.
[00:15:04] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:15:04] Speaker A: The greed, the power, the seven deadly sins, the anger. We love that shit. And so the more he brought that to life for us was like, oh my God, we totally got it right. Like, so anyway, like, it's just every single one of his plays have one of those, like really deep, like emotional connections make sense.
[00:15:22] Speaker B: Something that's relatable to everybody.
[00:15:23] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:15:24] Speaker B: Totally human behavior.
[00:15:24] Speaker A: Yes, yes, yes. So then again, right, all the folks in the audience, they just want to watch these characters unravel on stage.
[00:15:31] Speaker B: Yeah. They want to watch a shit show.
[00:15:32] Speaker A: That is the beauty of everything.
[00:15:34] Speaker B: The drama.
[00:15:35] Speaker A: Yes. And like, it's just like he spoke right to our human. He like dialed right into our human weakness and just knew exactly how to do it.
[00:15:43] Speaker B: Which I think is at that point makes it relatable.
[00:15:46] Speaker A: It makes it relatable. It makes it mind blowing. It makes it like that much better. Because again, sorry, teachers, I don't even remember my 10th grade teacher. Sorry, English teacher. But I will say this if I could explain this to 10th graders this way and then say, now, let's read this, right?
Dude, they're totally different. They're totally in, they're hooked, right? Because we're getting into the psychology of everything. And not just, lord, wherefore art thou?
What the fuck?
[00:16:12] Speaker B: Well, but it makes it. Again, the whole point of what he wrote was for it to be relatable and for it to touch the person that was listening and receiving it. And if there's a way to do that in today's world, I mean, it's still the same human emotion, but making it relatable in that way, it is
[00:16:27] Speaker A: totally the same thing.
[00:16:27] Speaker B: Makes it more engaging.
[00:16:29] Speaker A: Seven deadly sins. What was it 3,000 years ago? I don't remember when this whole thing started. Right. We are literally still relating today. And that was the whole point of us trying to like bring that episode out to the world. Because these things are just still in humans.
[00:16:42] Speaker B: But that's like the evolution, I know of humanity.
[00:16:46] Speaker A: But we pretend they're not anymore. So, like, nobody wants to talk about pride and greed and lust. What was it? Gluttony? Sloth? I don't remember all of them, which is terrible. I should remember all seven of them
[00:16:54] Speaker B: because I just did an episode on it.
[00:16:55] Speaker A: But like, that's what we hide in when we're alone at home in our own space. That's what we're hiding in. Whatever. The things we're doing, whether we're doom scrolling on our phone or we're judging someone or we're looking at porn, any of the things that we're choosing to do are all of this. And so I would argue that the more teachers express and explain this about him, the better it's going to be. But whatever.
[00:17:21] Speaker B: Well then, I mean, if they did, it would be more engaging to students who would then have a deeper passion and we wouldn't have a podcast called Sort of Sophisticated. So maybe teachers should just continue teaching
[00:17:30] Speaker A: at the ship and then we could do what, our thing. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, let's do that.
[00:17:33] Speaker B: Totally kidding. Was that. Did that play into like the narcissistic ego?
[00:17:37] Speaker A: It was perfect.
I mean, you're taught you're literally sitting across from a narcissistic egomaniac. So there you go. Okay.
[00:17:43] Speaker B: No, no, no.
[00:17:43] Speaker A: Are you ready for the next one?
[00:17:44] Speaker B: Yeah. Okay.
[00:17:45] Speaker A: Okay. All right. So so far we have his writing wasn't for sophisticated people. Yes.
Then we. Yeah, check, check. Then we have. He didn't even make up his own stories. He stole them all and just made them like way better. Okay, third twist. I'm gonna argue. What if he is famous just cause humans still suck and we're inherently evil?
[00:18:07] Speaker B: Huh?
[00:18:07] Speaker A: Yeah. So you ready for that?
[00:18:09] Speaker B: You gotta like unravel that one a little bit.
[00:18:10] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay. So I always thought his writing was very like deep, super complicated. I had a hard time understanding you needed a decoder ring.
[00:18:18] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:18:19] Speaker A: But remember, yeah. You said at the beginning where you were like, oh, but that was just a language back then. So that's where I think we get
[00:18:24] Speaker B: like a little bogged down.
[00:18:26] Speaker A: Yeah. So here's the deal. I'm gonna argue. Right. All his plays were pretty short. Do you remember reading his plays? Like these books were not long, very few acts, very short, Very Edgar Allan Poe. Ish. I mean, I know Edgar allan Poe is Mr. Short Story. This is longer, but this is still very short.
[00:18:41] Speaker B: Comparatively.
[00:18:42] Speaker A: Comparatively. So what if he's just ridiculously efficient and like short and I mean, dare I say it, lazy. Right. What if this is more about the fact that we as humans haven't changed in 400 years? And because he made it so simple for us to understand, we are more interested in his stories versus that they're very complex and deep? Because then we would be lost.
[00:19:13] Speaker B: I think you have to. You have to like, showcase this with each work. Okay, so Macbeth.
[00:19:17] Speaker A: Okay, okay, okay. Macbeth. Not complicated. It's literally a guy who ties his identity to his personal achievement and then goes nuts after he gets all this power. That's it. It's a power story. Nothing else to it. Right. Hamlet, the whole Hamlet story isn't deep. Hamlet goes insane, overthinking. I don't know if you remember, his uncle poisons his father, then marries his mother. And then Hamlet gets fro. He freezes and doesn't know what to do. And then. And everybody ends up dying at the end. It's terrible, including himself. Right, so that one's more about literally just overthinking to an extreme and being paralyzed and can't do anything about it. Romeo and Juliet, not very deep. Think about it. Two teenagers who basically, Amanda, just wanna fuck. That's it. And think they're soulmates. And it just turns out that their families won't ever let them be together because they're not allowed to be because of the way they grew up. The storyline is very, very basic. It really is. Now, the characters are amazing, the way that he shares the stories. But what I'm trying to explain is we haven't evolved. And as a result of us not evolving and really sticking to those like anger, greed, lust, envy, all these core principles. Right. Paralysis, whatever they are. It's just easy to relate to because he made it simple enough for us to relate to.
[00:20:27] Speaker B: I would argue that he was lazy. Okay, lazy.
[00:20:29] Speaker A: It's fine. That wasn't fair. I was being provocative.
[00:20:32] Speaker B: Okay, fair.
[00:20:33] Speaker A: Got it, got it, got it.
[00:20:34] Speaker B: But I do think, yes, he was being efficient and that like you said earlier, he had to like, hook people. Right. And so if he didn't get to the point, then people probably wouldn't have stuck around for. Whatever.
But do you think that we attribute more and this is like across all board with how we interpret history. We're like, oh, no, they were using this specific symbolism and blah, blah, blah. And maybe they were. But like, I don't know if I always believe. I completely agree with that. That's true.
[00:21:01] Speaker A: I'm with you completely.
[00:21:01] Speaker B: Or that we just have analyzed it so much and we look for a new angle, a new light, a new aha moment.
[00:21:07] Speaker A: This is exactly my point. Yes. I think 10th grade English teachers are literally just trying to justify their job. I know that sounds terrible. Like I'm being a total jerk by saying that, and I'm not. I think 10th grade English teachers are very important and super critical to like learning. But I think we are absolutely overanalyzing everything. This guy sat in a room in the 1600s, his son died. He had a shit ton of grief. He had a story about Hamlet. He used a little bit of his grief. He made a very simple awesome story out of it and put it all together that like hooked an audience. And in five minutes we were going crazy. And we loved it and good on him. He was amazing at doing that. But I think it's that simple. And then we do all the yes like with the poetry and this. Oh what if this and what if that we're crazy. We crazy are over analyzing.
[00:21:55] Speaker B: I think what you're saying is that teachers should stop trying to put him on a pedestal of like if you don't understand him, then you're not a leader sophisticated enough. That's it to it being palatable for the normal Joe in school or for anyone.
[00:22:09] Speaker A: That's how I would start everything. So if you did that, every kid would be interested in listening and reading. Now you've hooked the whole group the same thing he was trying to do.
[00:22:16] Speaker B: You've bought engagement.
[00:22:17] Speaker A: So theoretically teachers should be thinking like well if Shakespeare was trying to hook a group of people, how do I hook number one, then two, what would happen is those kids that were like super interested in Shakespeare and wanted to go on to get an English degree and the rest of their life more power to them. Go study everything, learn everything, be awesome. Go get excellent. Go get super sophisticated.
[00:22:35] Speaker B: I think you're advocating what I advocate all the time for our children about wanting them just to be inquisitive lifelong learners who are willing to ask questions. So then you take, you've now piqued their interest in something I've come over that allows them to then ask more complex questions where you can't overanalyze and be like I wonder if there was some symbolism here, if there was this. But then their self discovery, which means that they're engaged in it rather than just learning something for a test.
[00:23:05] Speaker A: That's it. Because at the end of the day isn't the whole point to figure out more self awareness to figure out, see the pattern, see the behavior, see like, like hey, why am I acting this way? Why do I have so much ego? Why do I care about this? Why do I crave that? Why am I jealous of that?
[00:23:20] Speaker B: And I think of even asking those questions and you can tie it back to even like Macbeth like you were saying, right? How it was basically got everything and then went mad, right?
[00:23:28] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:23:29] Speaker B: That somehow this can be applied to you. Maybe not the same situation as it was back in the 1500s, but, you know, what does that mean? How do you apply to today?
[00:23:38] Speaker A: And if you did that, like, geez, Amanda, in every act of every one of his stories, like people would listen.
[00:23:44] Speaker B: So I think you're also maybe arguing that we should really take Shakespeare and make it also into like a psychology, social, emotional awareness.
[00:23:53] Speaker A: How about this? How to teach coping skills to 10th graders. Yes.
[00:23:56] Speaker B: Literature.
[00:23:57] Speaker A: Through literature. Right. That, that.
[00:23:58] Speaker B: Like that.
Right. Because Hamlet, why was. Had, like, anxiety overthinking to the extreme.
[00:24:04] Speaker A: Do them all.
[00:24:04] Speaker B: You could do not have coping skills. I mean.
[00:24:07] Speaker A: Yep. Romeo and Juliet. Too impulsive. I mean, I know. Oh, my God. Love story. No, it's not. It's. They're too impulsive.
[00:24:12] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:24:12] Speaker A: They killed themselves. So I get the beauty of it. And like, oh, my God, it's so amazing. Right? This is so sophisticated.
[00:24:18] Speaker B: Romanticizing something that is not healthy.
[00:24:21] Speaker A: Bingo. You just nailed it. I love that. That's exactly it.
[00:24:23] Speaker B: Okay, so once we start seeing these patterns, then. And we start teaching it in a different light. So that way people are looking at it not just like Shakespeare in the text that he said. Are we then to what?
[00:24:36] Speaker A: You're supposed to memorize all the lines and then just quote him at a dinner party and feel like you're sort of sophisticated. To be or not to be.
Sorry.
[00:24:45] Speaker B: I guess I feel like if that were.
[00:24:46] Speaker A: Hold on. Let's see if you're sophisticated or not.
Let's do this. What is to be or not to be from which play?
[00:24:52] Speaker B: That is the question.
[00:24:54] Speaker A: Which play?
[00:24:55] Speaker B: No clue.
[00:24:55] Speaker A: Now, before this episode, I would have said you're not sophisticated because you don't know. But now after this episode, I would say, I don't give two shits if you know or not. Look at me learning over here. It was from Hamlet, actually. It was. Who would have known?
[00:25:12] Speaker B: I'm sure everybody else would know.
Okay, well, now that you brought up Hamlet, why don't you go off and talk about Hamnet? Not let net Hamnet the movie.
Long movie, short movie, two hours. Okay.
[00:25:26] Speaker A: No, no.
[00:25:26] Speaker B: Okay, so it's a movie movie.
[00:25:27] Speaker A: Yeah, it's total movie.
I loved it. I mean, I didn't. We don't have to, like, go into a whole detailed view of this whole thing, but basically, like, it's. It's interesting because the way that the director managed this whole thing, it's about their life before, then it's about them having kids. And then, of course, Hamnet passes So it all, like, you know, goes through the quick 11 years there. But then it's a lot about how Agnes, Slash Anne and William Shakespeare manage that grief differently. And by the way, which is so cool, they say his name one time in the movie because they don't want to make it about William Shakespeare at all. So this story is all around Agnes and the way she's dealing with it. Now, remember, he was in London and he went back and forth from Stratford Upon Avon all the way to 100 miles. So he would leave to go to London to be with his troop for a long time, come back. He wasn't there when his son died. So his wife was like, you wanna
[00:26:19] Speaker B: know a fun fact? What I learned over this past weekend, that before, when it was like horse drawn anything, it would take 10 days to go 165 miles.
[00:26:29] Speaker A: Holy Jesus.
[00:26:30] Speaker B: So if he was, you know, 100 miles away, it was tough. That would have taken a long time.
[00:26:34] Speaker A: So he. So he tried his best to get there and back, but, I mean, he was like. She didn't understand what he was doing.
He was. He was obviously trying to be a playwright and build a career, but at the same time, when his son died, he had a lot of grief that we didn't know how to process.
So the story is very interesting the way it sort of shows both of their grief paths and how they handle it. So it's very deep. Like, it's not dark, but it's emotionally very heavy. So, like, strap it on if you guys are gonna watch it. I thought it was excellent. 10 out of 10. Like, I hope it wins. I thought, I don't know who played. I don't know what actress played Agnes, but she was remarkable. But anyway, long story short, spoiler. She ends up going to London to watch one of his performances of Hamlet without him knowing.
And she sees through the play how he's processing his grief.
[00:27:29] Speaker B: Oh, interesting.
[00:27:30] Speaker A: And it, like the light bulb just goes. She's just like, oh, my God. He's not crazy. He just is handling it so much different than I am. So you get the sense sort of halfway through when. When Hamnet dies that they hate each other like, that they're like going in two directions. That's not really what's happening. It's showing you how two people process grief completely differently but still have to get through it and still have to be a family. And as far as I know and anything I looked up in research, they stayed together their whole life. They never got divorced. He died at 52 years old. Which arguably was old enough. They don't know exactly what he died from, but I mean, it could be old age. It could be, you know, maybe some flight.
[00:28:07] Speaker B: Even that story, there's beauty in it, right? Of like, there's also a love story to be shared about his life versus just his work. Like, he was so much more than just his work. His life, you know, was so much more. This was there, his family.
[00:28:22] Speaker A: It was incredible. I don't know if it'll win best picture because I will tell you, it is a slow movie, like, because you already know he's gonna die and he dies halfway through the movie. It's not like there's some climax, right?
I think what's. What was like, oh, my God, the score, the music. Holy shit. Like, Amanda, five notes, maybe six notes, and just the way they play it. And then like another four notes or five.
Holy shit. I hope it wins. Just for that alone. Like, if it wins best picture, fine.
[00:28:51] Speaker B: But like, best score, that's what you're going for.
[00:28:53] Speaker A: Oh, my God. Even Luke, who's sitting there, wasn't even watching the whole movie with me. He's like, playing on his phone or doing whatever. He's like, this is incredible. I'm like, isn't it wild the way music, when it lays over. Oh, my God, no. Great, great, great.
[00:29:04] Speaker B: Do you know what else is incredible?
[00:29:05] Speaker A: What?
[00:29:06] Speaker B: Fun facts.
Are we there yet? Is that time?
[00:29:11] Speaker A: I think it's funny that you have this get out of jail free card. You could pull a ripcord whenever you want. I'm done with this episode. Peter, you know what else is incredible? Fun facts. Like, you're allowed to do that every time. I'm just like, babbling.
[00:29:22] Speaker B: I just love fun facts.
[00:29:23] Speaker A: I want to do an episode where I go, okay, Amanda, I'm done listening. Fun facts.
That's code, by the way. That's Amanda's code. See, I've learned this of she's ready.
[00:29:33] Speaker B: No, but like, fun facts also are very educational, and it's a thing that's like my go to. To use when talking about any of these topics.
[00:29:42] Speaker A: I got fun facts, okay? I got some wild ass fun facts about. These are actually about William Shakespeare, like, not about Hamnet or anything. No, no twists. These are real.
[00:29:52] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:29:52] Speaker A: All right, number one. How about this one? Did you know he put a curse on his own grave?
Yeah, he did.
[00:29:59] Speaker B: Okay, interesting. Continue.
[00:30:01] Speaker A: Well, because his wife was a little bit of. She was like a gypsy, sort of like nature, like witch. Yeah. Okay. His tomb in Stratford upon Avon literally has an Inscription on it that warns anyone who would dare try to move his bones. It says, blessed be the man that spares these stones, and cursed be he that moves my bones.
Huh.
[00:30:22] Speaker B: I don't know if that's, like, super witchy or if it's just, like, a.
Because back then there were, like, grave robbers all the time. I don't even know, so that tracks.
[00:30:29] Speaker A: Do you wonder if his bones are even still in there? What if somebody already moved?
[00:30:31] Speaker B: Yeah, probably.
[00:30:31] Speaker A: That's kind of weird. Should I have said that with, like, a piratey accent?
Like, blessed be the man. Okay, number two. The greatest playwright of all time. Okay. Boy, Billy, right? Inconsistently spelled his own name, like Shakespeare. Like, when he would sign, like, documents, like, historians have actual evidence of his signatures that he wrote, where he spells it, sometimes with an E, sometimes with no a, sometime sometimes without the E. It's, like, really weird, right? I guess when I looked it all up, like, spelling wasn't standardized back then, so it, like, didn't matter. Like, everything was the same. It was just sort of like, you know, like how you do it right now. Like, you sign your autograph or you sign your. Your signature, whatever. It's like. Okay, it's not perfect. Same, same. And then they were able to realize, like, he was signing it different all the time. Huh. That's kind of wild. Interesting. Number three. Okay. The Globe Theater. You remember the Globe Theater?
[00:31:20] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Is that the reason why it's called the Golden Globe Award?
[00:31:23] Speaker A: Oh, no, I have no idea.
[00:31:24] Speaker B: I don't know. Just Globe and Globe. It's just interesting. Anyways, continue.
[00:31:26] Speaker A: We should look that up. We should know that. I don't. It could be. So. Yeah, I guess it burned down, like, in his lifetime because of. Because of cannon fire. Cannon fire. So check this out. During a performance of Henry VIII in 1613, that was only, like, 14 years after it was built. Anyway, there's a scene where they fire a stage cannon and sparks actually hit the roof and. And the whole theater went up in flames, like, right there. Right. Because it's like a thatched roof back in the day.
[00:31:55] Speaker B: Like.
[00:31:55] Speaker A: Yeah, they actually do a good job. The setting of Hamnet. Like, the setting is really well done.
[00:32:00] Speaker B: Really?
[00:32:00] Speaker A: Yeah. Super well done. Okay. Did you find it yet or.
[00:32:02] Speaker B: No, No, I don't think it is.
[00:32:04] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:32:04] Speaker B: No, no, not named after the Globe Theater.
[00:32:08] Speaker A: Okay, fine. That would have been good.
Number four. So Shakespeare is one of the few famous people, like, from back then, who actually retired wealthy. Oh, no, Starving.
[00:32:16] Speaker B: Well, you said. I mean, he was, like, well known. During his time. So that would track that he wasn't.
[00:32:22] Speaker A: He retired. He, like, had enough money to retire. So after he finished writing, he went back home to Stratford upon Avon and invested in grain and, like, became, like, a businessman and did other things. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Totally. I know.
[00:32:33] Speaker B: Must be nice when you become famous when you're alive. Right?
[00:32:35] Speaker A: Let's go. And finally, this one is the best. Even though he was rich, he barely mentions his wife, Anne. Agnes. Anne, in his will. The famous line reads, the only line they found associated with Ann in his will is, to my wife Anne Hathaway is left the second best bed. That's it. So. Which sounds, like, totally shady, I know, but I'm totally setting you up. You need some context. So it's true. His wife explicitly, like, didn't get anything in the will except the second best bed because the majority of shit went to his daughters, Judith and Susanna. But back then, under English common law, a widow was automatically given one third of the estate. It's called the dower's. Right.
[00:33:15] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:33:16] Speaker A: You don't need to write anything down in a way, ever.
It's automatically hers. So she was already guaranteed that. Legally, it doesn't even matter. So the whole second best bed thing comes from the fact that back then, I guess the best bed, the first best bed in the house, was always reserved for guests.
They didn't sleep in it. So him and his wife always slept in the second best bed anyway. That's where the married couples would sleep. So I think it was, like, not really a snub. They, like, pretend it's a snub, but it's sort of a cute, romantic way of saying, like, babe, you got our bet. Like, my bed is yours. Remember I love you. Yeah. Like, I mean, I think it was just sort of a cute way of doing his thing.
[00:33:50] Speaker B: Okay, so he cursed his grave. He couldn't spell his own name. The theater burned down because of a cannon. He retired rich, and Anne got the second best bed because he loved her.
[00:34:01] Speaker A: He did. Because he was a hopeless romantic. I think that's cute.
[00:34:04] Speaker B: That is cute. That is cute.
[00:34:05] Speaker A: He's my guy.
[00:34:06] Speaker B: I love it. Okay, well, if we want to learn more about your guy, what should we do?
[00:34:10] Speaker A: Well, you can go back to 10th grade.
[00:34:12] Speaker B: No, I don't want to do that.
[00:34:13] Speaker A: Okay, fine.
[00:34:14] Speaker B: Try again. Try again.
[00:34:15] Speaker A: Let's see. So start. I'd watch Macbeth. That'd be the one I'd pick. If you're going to watch anything on Shakespeare, learn about Shakespeare.
[00:34:21] Speaker B: Theater, play or, like, movie. Okay.
[00:34:22] Speaker A: I do. I do either.
[00:34:23] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:34:24] Speaker A: You want to get a sense of who he is. Doesn't matter to me. Right. I would go to the venue if you could, but if not, just please watch anything. Maybe Romeo and Juliet, the one with Leonardo DiCaprio, that's like another. I'm just trying to. I'm thinking of hooking an audience. Right.
[00:34:35] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:34:35] Speaker A: So Macbeth.
That's all.
If you want to read something, read something called Hag Seed by Margaret Atwood. It was published in 2016 and it's a really cool modern version of Shakespeare's original Tempest. So it's not the same at all. Like, don't think it is. It's all updated so you can just see how Shakespeare is the total blueprint, like I was saying. And you can still write kick ass updated books like that are similar. So it's a real good, like, through line.
[00:35:03] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:35:03] Speaker A: It's one of the best through lines. Yeah, yeah. Or if you want to listen to a podcast that's way more sophisticated than ours, it's called Shakespeare Unlimited and they drop new episodes weekly and they connect Shakespeare and his stories to real things going on today. So, like we're trying to do, but
[00:35:18] Speaker B: I would say probably very Shakespeare focused.
[00:35:19] Speaker A: Yeah, they're probably just like more sophisticated, depthy stuff than the things they're trying to do. I don't think they're getting into the psychology stuff like we are. Yeah, yeah. And if you don't want to do any of that, then just remember these details to seem sophisticated about Shakespeare, even though that's the opposite of what we want you to do. Okay. First, William Shakespeare was a small town kid from Stratford upon Avon who didn't go to university, moved to London in his 20s, became an actor and a shareholder in a theater company, helped build the Globe Theater, not related to the Golden Globes, and turned writing plays into a wildly successful business.
He was not a tortured recluse. He was an entertainment entrepreneur, a galore people.
Second, he didn't invent most of his plots. Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Macbeth, all were based on earlier stories. What he invented was the psychological engine that we were talking about underneath all of those to keep people interested in.
Third, he wasn't writing for intellectual elites. He was writing for loud, chaotic beer drinking crowds who would absolutely walk the fuck away if you didn't hook them fast. Murder, betrayal, ghost stories, sex, egos, anything. That was all strategy. None of this bullshit deep symbolism that, like, Amanda was like, oh, my God. Our teachers taught us all that. No, it was just for shock value. He Was Howard Stern of 1601. Fourth, the only reason he became high culture or sophisticated in the first place is because historians decided to paint him that way. In his lifetime, he was totally popular and respected. But this whole refined curriculum y guy like that we know today was constructed because of universities and critics and people who just wanted to make money.
Fifth, he's not deep the way schools made him seem. He's efficient. Like we were saying earlier, Macbeth is about ego spiraling. Hamlet is overthinking. Romeo and Juliet is impulsivity. King Lear is pride that ages badly. Clean human recognizable traits, people. And finally, the reason he still works isn't because he was mystical. It's because humans haven't changed. Ego, jealousy, ambition, insecurity.
Same wiring, different century. It's that simple. He didn't predict the future. He just exposed the pattern.
[00:37:31] Speaker B: And there you have it, fellow listeners. A slightly unhinged tour through the mind of the man who basically turned human flaws into entertainment.
[00:37:38] Speaker A: Yes, he did.
[00:37:39] Speaker B: From provincial England to the biggest stage in London, Shakespeare wasn't just writing plays. He was mapping how people crave power, fall in love, sabotage themselves, and spiral out of control. So we did our job today. Remember, you're not supposed to be walking away with memorized quotes. You're walking away with sharper instincts. You'll start noticing the ambition that tips into obsession, the doubt that freezes action, the pride that ages poorly, or the jealousy that just poisons everything.
[00:38:05] Speaker A: You know what? You know, that's interesting because each one of those sort of like the ambition that tips into obsession, like in between. There.
[00:38:10] Speaker B: That's like very lineal.
[00:38:12] Speaker A: That's very liminal.
[00:38:12] Speaker B: Oh, liminal. Damn it, that's close.
[00:38:16] Speaker A: We're so close.
Did we even use that today or. No, we did.
[00:38:19] Speaker B: I used it earlier, remember?
[00:38:20] Speaker A: You did all right. You were a badass. Sorry. Go ahead. Yeah, yeah.
[00:38:22] Speaker B: So if you enjoyed this episode, subscribe, leave a review and send it to someone who still thinks Shakespeare belongs in 10th grade lit class instead of on every show they binge. So until next time, stay curious, stay clever, and try not to turn your next minor inconvenience into a full blown tragedy.
