Firefly, ala Shakespeare..... by JRC

GENERAL DISCUSSIONS

Firefly, ala Shakespeare.....

POSTED BY: JRC
UPDATED: Friday, April 25, 2008 02:51
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VIEWED: 4999
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Monday, April 21, 2008 2:48 PM

I just saw this on whedonesque.com, and apologies if it was posted before.

http://evilrooster.livejournal.com/1042.html

Really quite lovely.

Everyone dies alone.

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Monday, April 21, 2008 2:54 PM

LEOPARDFLAN

Ow..... you're hurting my brain...

Sorry, I'm sure it's very lovely, but I'm sick of Shakespeare already (have to do him in class, you know how it is)

#~%~~*~~~&~~~*~~%~#\/#~%~~*~~~&~~~*~~%~#

\~~~*~~^~~*~~~/$$\~~~*~~^~~*~~~/
98% of teens have smoked pot, if you are one of the 2% that haven't, copy this into your signature.

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Monday, April 21, 2008 2:57 PM

YINYANG

You were busy trying to get yourself lit on fire. It happens.

That is so awesome!

Once a lurker, always a lurker.

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Monday, April 21, 2008 4:18 PM

FREEBROWNCOAT

Excellent rewriting. Kept our BDH in character while doing his soliloquy (sp). Now where was it I heard Captain tightpants rue the death of his friend, Yorick?
Methinks Yosafbridg did the veritable touch.

"I didn't kill you."

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Monday, April 21, 2008 4:36 PM

FREELANCERTEX

wait, i'm confused...what does this have to do with shakespeare? (yes i read the link)

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Monday, April 21, 2008 4:49 PM

ALLIETHORN7

Classic.
Ly.
Done, that is. Made me giggle and such. I liked it.

-Danny

Late night, Brakes lock,
Hear the tires squeal,
Red light, can't stop, so I spin the wheel,
My world goes Black before I
Feel an Angel lift me up,
And I open Bloodshot eyes,
Into fluorescent White,
Flip the Siren, Hit the Lights,
Close the doors and I am Gone
The Band of the week is... Thrice

Gott weiß ich will kein Engel sein.
http://www.myspace.com/otherrandomdude

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Monday, April 21, 2008 5:05 PM

YINYANG

You were busy trying to get yourself lit on fire. It happens.

Quote:
Originally posted by freelancertex:
wait, i'm confused...what does this have to do with shakespeare? (yes i read the link)

If you follow the link trail back, it ends up at a journal entry that advertises this - http://pulpbard.wikispaces.com. So, basically, the poster of the Firefly prose was imitating a guy who was imitating Shakespeare, and imagining if Shakespeare had written something like Pulp Fiction.

Plus, Shakespeare is most commonly associated with iambic pentameter.

Did I just type too much? Here, have an emote.

Edit: Oh, and apparently Shakespeare wrote in a particular style, which the Firefly prose mimicked. At least according to the people at Whedonesque, who probably know what they're talking about.

http://whedonesque.com/comments/16126

Once a lurker, always a lurker.

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Tuesday, April 22, 2008 12:42 AM

AGATSU

Quote:
Originally posted by LeopardFlan:
Ow..... you're hurting my brain...

Sorry, I'm sure it's very lovely, but I'm sick of Shakespeare already (have to do him in class, you know how it is)

Aw, come on, Shakespeare's great! WILL POWEEEEER!

That short take at Mal's Speech and the Serenity end dialogue is awesome... that guy's really got talent - and that's from a guy who loveth Shakespeare's work.

Admittedly, depending on what you have to read in school, it can be kind of tiresome at times. Especially the "have to" part. I hope you'll change your mind and grow to love olde William's works. I also recommend Kenneth Brannagh's Shakespeare movies - very entertaining. Well, if you dig Shakespeare, that is. (Psssst... or if you don't want to READ Shakespeare...)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Dude, you never wanna f*ck with a Browncoat, man." - Kevin Smith

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Tuesday, April 22, 2008 1:39 AM

LEOPARDFLAN

We're having to read Romeo&Juliet, and it is boring, and stupid. Everyone has plots within plots and nobody knows what anyone's doing, and there are about a million different ways they could have tried to get their goal.

#~%~~*~~~&~~~*~~%~#\/#~%~~*~~~&~~~*~~%~#

\~~~*~~^~~*~~~/$$\~~~*~~^~~*~~~/
98% of teens have smoked pot, if you are one of the 2% that haven't, copy this into your signature.

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Tuesday, April 22, 2008 3:49 AM

LYSANDER

You have obviously missed he whole point of what you are reading. It is not so much about the million ways they could have been together, it's about the time and the struggles that took place. All of Shakespeare's works have elements of truth in them. This sort of thing was more common than people think. And it's really too bad that you think it is so "stupid" but I guess everybody is entitiled to their own opinions.

Simon: What if he(Mal) tells you to kill me?
Zoe: (without hesitation) I kill you.

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Tuesday, April 22, 2008 6:15 AM

NEWOLDBROWNCOAT

Quote:
Originally posted by LeopardFlan:
We're having to read Romeo&Juliet, and it is boring, and stupid.

If you can find it, look at the Zifferelli film, from like 1968- It's available on DVD, I own a copy. Olivia Hussey as Juliet,can't remember who played Romeo, Michael York as a very nasty Tybalt. Youngish, unknown actors as the leads, and it's so beautiful it'll make your eyes pop.

It may be stupid-- I agree that they make a couple of bad choices-- but don't just watch it with your eyes and mind- try to FEEL what those characters are feeling-- any of them. R & J in overwhelming young love, Mercutio looking for fun and comedy and getting killed, Tybalt and Lady Capulet long on pride and revenge, Old Capulet brought down at the end by loss. even the Nurse, bawdy and wise and loving.

Also if you can get it, look at Shakespeare in Love, from a few years ago. It's a fanciful but realistic look at how R & J could have been written

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Wednesday, April 23, 2008 3:58 AM

SPACEANJL

Do you guys get the 'Orange' phone ads? 'Cos that is just ripe for the piss-taking.

Y'know, if Romeo and Juliet had had the right talk-plan, there would have been no need for all the poison and priest stuff...

On the plus side, there is a good sword fight in the play.

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Wednesday, April 23, 2008 11:44 AM

DONCOAT

I'd just like to say that I think the linked page is one of the very finest examples of Firefliana (Serenitiana?) I've ever come across.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I'm pointin' right at it!

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Wednesday, April 23, 2008 2:04 PM

HUGHFF

Quote:
Originally posted by LeopardFlan:
We're having to read Romeo&Juliet, and it is boring, and stupid. Everyone has plots within plots and nobody knows what anyone's doing, and there are about a million different ways they could have tried to get their goal.

The play is, contrary to popular belief, not so much about love. The only "love" is teenage hormonal lust: Romeo and Juliet (aged 17 and 13 respectively) are horny and get married so they can have sex. (In fact, 5 minutes before he met Juliet, Romeo was panting all over her cousin Rosaline.)

More important, from my perspective (I teach this play) is the conflict between the generations. Romeo's relationship with his parents is so dysfunctional that he never speaks to them at all - in fact, Benvolio has to act as a go-between for them because they're so concerned.

Juliet's relationship with Capulet is even more upsetting. In Act I, both say that they will only consider Juliet marrying Paris if the other agrees. "My will to her consent is but a part..." he says and she counters, "...no more deep will I endart mine eye than your consent gives strength to make it fly." However, in the next act, she marries Romeo without mentioning him to her father (obviously she realises he wouldn't allow it.) Less than 24 hours later he promises Paris that she will marry him.

When Juliet defies him on this (again obviously, she can't give the reason) he forces her to do as he commands. In fact, his threat to cut her off is incredibly powerful and would have reduced her to prostitution or begging to survive. "An you be mine, I give you to my friend; An you be not, hang, beg, starve, die in the streets, for, by my soul, I'll ne'er acknowledge thee nor what is mine shall never do thee good."

You can then discuss the analogous action to Capulet/Juliet, which is Capulet/Tybalt. Like Juliet, Tybalt lets his emotions cloud his common sense, though in his case it is anger - he discovers Romeo at the party and plans to kill him. Capulet cuts him down to size and forbids it, again with considerable force. Foreshadowing Juliet defying Capulet, Tybalt seeks Romeo out the next morning to kill him, well aware that the penalty for ths is his own execution.

This is the essential generational conflict: the older generation wrap the younger one up too tightly, treating teenagers like children and denying them the chance to learn from their mistakes. Meanwhile the youths assume that adults don't understand them and deliberately do what they have already decided rather than asking if their parent's (or uncle's for Tybalt) extra experience gives them a deeper insight.

Of course there's no right answer to this problem and Shakespeare, keen observer of human foibles that he was, doesn't try to point one out. He simply "lets" the events unfold to their inevitable conclusion given the "tragic character flaws" or "errors of judgement" (harmatia.) Tybalt's rebellion leads to him murdering Mercutio, scion of the Prince, while R and J's little rebellion not only leads to their suicides but also the death of Paris (why Romeo, why?) and, arguably, Lady Montague, who passes away in the night from grief less than two days after her son is banished.

As far as boring: You have two massive sword fights (Tybalt v Mercutio which segues into Tybalt v Romeo in Act III, Romeo v Paris in Act V); a massive all-in brawl, again with the swords, in Act I; and a sex scene as Romeo and Juliet consumate their marriage.

It's also (dare I allude to Joss here) full of jokes amongst the action. The Nurse is prone to providing waaay too much information, "Now by my maidenhead at 12 year old..." "I am the drudge and toil in your delight, but you shall bear the burden soon at night." Mercutio has a mind that is almost as grubby. The speech he makes in Act II scene 1 is a masterpiece of double entendre:

I conjure thee by Rosaline's bright eyes,
By her high forehead and her scarlet lip,
By her fine foot, straight leg and quivering thigh
And the demesnes that there adjacent lie,
That in thy likeness thou appear to us!

'twould anger him
To raise a spirit in his mistress' circle
Of some strange nature, letting it there stand
Till she had laid it and conjured it down;
That were some spite: my invocation
Is fair and honest, and in his mistress' name
I conjure only but to raise up him.

O, that she were
An open et caetera, thou a poperin pear!

Shakespeare was a filthy bugger. Most pornography has fewer references to male and female genitals, erections and ejaculation.

Best of luck with your studies.

BTW, NewOldBrownCoat's mention of Shakespeare in Love allows me to recommend Moliere. Moliere was the French Shakespeare, writing about 50 years later. This new movie (it's in French with English subtitles) is outstanding.

www.cpfc.org - my life

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Wednesday, April 23, 2008 2:39 PM

VETERAN

Don't squat with your spurs on.

Bravo Hugh. That was a good read. I never thought about this play from those angles.

About the earlier comment someone made... did Shakespeare write most of his poetry in iambicpentameter?

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Wednesday, April 23, 2008 3:29 PM

YINYANG

You were busy trying to get yourself lit on fire. It happens.

Quote:
Originally posted by Veteran:
About the earlier comment someone made... did Shakespeare write most of his poetry in iambicpentameter?

I believe so, yes.

Once a lurker, always a lurker.

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Wednesday, April 23, 2008 4:20 PM

TRAVELER

My all time favorite is "Much Ado About Nothing".

Good humor and still very dramatic with a bittersweet ending.

http://www.imdb.com/mymovies/list?l=28764731
Traveler

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Wednesday, April 23, 2008 4:59 PM

HUGHFF

Quote:
Originally posted by Veteran:
Bravo Hugh. That was a good read. I never thought about this play from those angles.

About the earlier comment someone made... did Shakespeare write most of his poetry in iambic pentameter?

Thank you.

And the answer is yes....and no. All the sonnets, being sonnets, are iambic pentameter, of course. The dominant form of his plays is blank verse (unrhymed iambic pentameter) but he does vary. For example, the porter's speech in the "Scottish Play" isn't even poetry, it's prose.

www.cpfc.org - my life

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Wednesday, April 23, 2008 10:18 PM

AGATSU

Quote:
Originally posted by hughff:
For example, the porter's speech in the "Scottish Play" isn't even poetry, it's prose.

I knew it! What a hack, that Shakespeare fella.
Good read on the R&J interpretation, btw - should help LeopardFlan a bunch, and was very insightful, sensei.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Dude, you never wanna f*ck with a Browncoat, man." - Kevin Smith

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Wednesday, April 23, 2008 10:21 PM

AGATSU

Quote:
Originally posted by traveler:
My all time favorite is "Much Ado About Nothing".

Good humor and still very dramatic with a bittersweet ending.

I like the movie as well - even better than the read, imho. And yes, I DID read it, but Brannagh really knows his Shakespeare and translates it to the screen beautifully.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Dude, you never wanna f*ck with a Browncoat, man." - Kevin Smith

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Thursday, April 24, 2008 2:35 PM

TRAVELER

Quote:
Originally posted by Agatsu:
Quote:
Originally posted by traveler:
My all time favorite is "Much Ado About Nothing".

Good humor and still very dramatic with a bittersweet ending.

I like the movie as well - even better than the read, imho. And yes, I DID read it, but Brannagh really knows his Shakespeare and translates it to the screen beautifully.

I caught things in the movie that I had missed in reading it. They did a fine job of this play.

http://www.imdb.com/mymovies/list?l=28764731
Traveler

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Thursday, April 24, 2008 2:53 PM

AGATSU

I especially liked Michael Keaton as Dogberry. SO much funnier than just reading it.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Dude, you never wanna f*ck with a Browncoat, man." - Kevin Smith

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Thursday, April 24, 2008 3:12 PM

TRAVELER

There were times I swear I could feel the spit on my face as Keaton spoke. I am not an expert on Shakespeare, but I read through his plays again and again so my understanding of what is happening becomes more clear. Seeing them actually performed is the best. I had seen Much Ado performed by others, but this version was better and they really expressed their feelings well. I have this play on VHS so I am able to see it again and again. I never get tired of it.

http://www.imdb.com/mymovies/list?l=28764731
Traveler

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Thursday, April 24, 2008 4:39 PM

VETERAN

Don't squat with your spurs on.

Right, when he's answering the door and rambling about answering the gates of hell to how drink will "add to the desire while taking away from the means."

But I thought that Shakespeare usually wrote commoner's lines in prose.

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Thursday, April 24, 2008 5:39 PM

HUGHFF

"it promotes the desire, but takes away the performance"

It's not for common folk exclusively or even particularly. He uses prose for vulgar matters, mundane matters, humour; anything that is lowly is likely to be in prose. Therefore Lady McB's sleepwalking soliloquy is in prose because, despite being a queen and not even slightly common, she's been stripped of all dignity and is shambling pathetically toward her death. Mercutio gets verse for his sexual jokes because they are clever puns and the Elizabethan/Jacobian audience felt puns were a sign of great wit.

Still on the Scottish play, the witches lines are often in trochaic tetrameter to make them seem more menacing and otherworldly.

www.cpfc.org - my life

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Thursday, April 24, 2008 7:43 PM

MOJAVE

JRC, that was awesome and thank you for posting it. There has to be a way to get Nathan to put up an mp3 of his best reading. Hugh, thanks for the Romeo and Juliet analysis. If you ever want to list the Shakespearean references in Firefly, it's a post I'd read.

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Friday, April 25, 2008 2:51 AM

CYBERSNARK

*finally has time to read this*

Huge Shakespeare fan here, though I'll be the first to agree that he was a shameless hack; the Michael Bay of his era. That's exactly why I love him. If he was alive today, he'd probably be hard at work on Snakes on a Plane II.

Everything he wrote was stolen from pre-existing sources and rewritten to pander to his audience (for a paycheque). That fact that he did it so beautifully (and is now held up as this Patron Deity of The Arts) is like some cosmic joke on those who go on about how Art justifies itself and should be unburdened by practical needs and uses.

I really want to see Gonzo's Romeo X Juliet adaptation licensed. Yeah, it's completely different from Shakespeare, but given his own tendencies to rewriting (and Gonzo's demonstrated skill with reimaginings), I think the Bard would've enjoyed seeing it.

And yes, he certainly would've been a Browncoat. Favourite character would probably have been Jayne.

For more Shakespeare-on-TV goodness, check out the Doctor Who episode "The Shakespeare Code" for my favourite onscreen portrayal of him. You'll also want to check out Disney's Gargoyles, which has some of the best "modern Shakespearean" verse anywhere.

"Isle of towers of glass and stone,
The Lady waits for him alone.
Ebon glass in emerald frame,
Pure white lilies speak her name.
Blood's red bane in dragon stone,
Excalibur waits for him alone."

"Avalon's Lord, be thou enchained,
Thy power to child's strength restrained.
'Til hunt be done and issue known,
This contest win by craft alone."

Plus, the Gargoyles version of Macbeth's story is (aside from the Gargs themselves) more historically-accurate than what Shakey wrote.

-----
We applied the cortical electrodes but were unable to get a neural reaction from either patient.

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