Poll: Is shakespeare great?

[Sixcess]

I think part of the problem is most people get exposed to him first through reading one or other of the plays at school. When I was at school and we read Othello I don't think any of us 'got it' until the teacher brought in a video of a BBC production with Bob Hoskins as Iago.

Genius move. Shakespeare is often seen as lofty, artsy, 'poncy'... but Bob Hoskins was just a regular bloke as well as being a very good and charismatic actor. And he was in The Long Good Friday, so he was cool.

Then we got it.

 

[wintercoat]

Shakespeare was an amazing writer, however the pedestal he's put upon is rather ridiculous.

Were his plays good? Yes.
Do they deserve the almost cult-like following by English teachers and Drama students? No.

 

[Yopaz]

The sheer arrogance of this board continues to amaze. Its relentless. Shakespeare is the best selling author of all time. Its estimated that over 500 billion of his works have been sold; works that influence every piece of fiction in our culture to this day. Not just plays and books, but games, movies, television, EVERYTHING.

But eh, let's ignore all that and declare him "overrated".

Unbelievable. Absolutely epic.

Justin Bieber is (according to Google trends) more popular than Jesus and a lot more popular than Shakespeare. Yet I call Justin Bieber overrated. Just because something sells well it doesn't mean it can't be overrated, in fact that's the definition of overrated. When you call people ignorant for considering him overrated then you prove that you're quite ignorant yourself.

OT: Personally I haven't really read much of Shakespeare, but I've seen some plays and well, there have been some good, some brilliant, some bad and some terrible. However it's not really my cup of tea. The thing is that Shakespeare's work can be interpreted in ways to make it stay relevant even now. To be able to accomplish that you have to be pretty good.

 

[Ulquiorra4sama]

Sure he's overrated, but that doesn't mean his stuff isn't good.

Shakespeare is to world culture what Valve is to the Escapist!

In all seriousness i have to say i do like quite a lot of Shakespeare's works, but they are certainly being held a bit too high when we're at the point where you sudenly validate yourself as an intellectual being by quoting him in a single conversation.

I suppose i just enjoy his stories a lot because they feel so well told. He didn't become one of the most famous wordsmiths in history by drooling on a piece of paper.

 

[Chairman Miaow]

Overrated.
Shoot me.
Sure, you can find him amazing if you want, doesn't make him the best author of all time that everybody should watch and love, or else be counted as uneducated and the literature equivalent of CoD players [The group gamers generally scapegoat for anything uneducated, or to do with streamlining and such].
He may be good, but don't expect me to love him. He's boring. He can't hold the attention of most people I know for more than 5 minutes with his works. Other great writers existed in his time, existed since his time, and exist today - and few people worship them as much as some worship Shakespeare.
Personal taste, is all I have to say. Of the few people I know that actually like Shakespeare, most believe he completely transcends personal taste, and is great no matter what you like, and if you don't think you like him, you just don't get it and need to read it again. Seriously, they're like Bioware and the ME3 ending. People like that, who give him the "God of all writing" rating, are the reason I find him overrated. Otherwise, he's just mediocre.

Have you ever seen Shakespeare performed?

 

[Raven's Nest]

I find him boring and i think he uses too many words...

I have literally found interpretive dance more effective at conveying a narrative than any of Shakespeare's work.

Plus, im fairly convinced about the theories of Shakespeare not actually being the one who wrote the works. Not that it really matters anyway.

 

[busterkeatonrules]

The sheer arrogance of this board continues to amaze. Its relentless. Shakespeare is the best selling author of all time. Its estimated that over 500 billion of his works have been sold; works that influence every piece of fiction in our culture to this day. Not just plays and books, but games, movies, television, EVERYTHING.

But eh, let's ignore all that and declare him "overrated".

Unbelievable. Absolutely epic.

I'm pretty sure that Shakespeare's status as human history's number 1 bestseller is first and foremost a result of his books having been regularily purchased wholesale by schools, colleges and public libraries for centuries - which, in turn, is a result of them being overrated.

As has been pointed out previously, Shakespeare's work was never intended to be art. He was merely trying to write stuff that the general public would pay money to see on a stage. Murder + mayhem + forbidden love = profit.

Certainly, his work is generally well-written and entertaining, but that's all there is to it. Those who insist on scouring those ancient pages for hidden symbolism and alternative meanings, are simply missing the point. We might as well be making school kids study the Harry Potter series.

 

[370999]

His plots aren't great but his skill with the english language is utterly superb. He can use it so masterful and make even the most basic sentence a delight to hear.

 

[Robert Ewing]

He's great because he popularized the English language single handedly! If he hadn't of existed, English would be a reaaalllyyy obscure European language today. In fact, most of England would probably be speaking some dialect of French. And in turn, so would you America.

He created a shit load of plays and poems, and almost all of them are considered masterpieces by his times standard, which is a pretty good achievement.

He invented well over 2 trillion words. True story. I kid, somewhere around the 2000 mark I think, I can't really remember.

Obviously you can't compare him to poets and playwrights today, because they're in totally different leagues. And you need to know, that poems and plays where the fucking biggest deal ever back then. They had no other form of media entertainment, that was it.

In the same way you can't compare Michaelangelo's helicopter drawing with an actual helicopter schematic. But you still know that Michaelangelo was a fucking genius.

 

[Scarim Coral]

Sure he was great during his time but these days his works is a pain in the ass to decipher as an English assignments.

 

[hatseflats]

The sheer arrogance of this board continues to amaze. Its relentless. Shakespeare is the best selling author of all time. Its estimated that over 500 billion of his works have been sold; works that influence every piece of fiction in our culture to this day. Not just plays and books, but games, movies, television, EVERYTHING.

But eh, let's ignore all that and declare him "overrated".

Unbelievable. Absolutely epic.

For something to be overrated it would have to be popular and critically acclaimed...
Plus, just because many people like Shakespeare doesn't mean it's actually great. Again, kind of the definition of overrated.

Basically what people are doing is the opposite of what you're saying: they see how incredibly popular Shakespeare's writing is but are arguing that may not be justified.

I'm not sure I agree. While I don't think his works are better than contemporary works, his influence on later works is undeniable and for its time it's quite magnificent. To put it in differently: his achievement is extraordinary, his works aren't (that is, not anymore).

 

[NotSoLoneWanderer]

If it weren't for the whole "Victorian English thing" he did I might be inspired to look into more of his works but relative to my modern surroundings and the literature I'm used to it's bland and needlessly roundabout. I understand everything he writes. That isn't hard at all but I just don't care for his writing style.

Edit: I appreciate his works in a historical sense but not the works themselves.

 

[tombman888]

I swear to god if i hear his name again after i finish school, i will rip off the mouth of the person who said it.

(basically i'm saying i don't like him)

 

[paislyabmj]

He is certainly the most influential writer in the English language but influential doesn't always translate into good(think twilight(no i am not comparing shakespear with twilight just using it as an analogy))but it is beyond my experience to pass judgement on the quality of his works(though I would offer that his characters often seem to me a lot less organic or real than what I expect from modern literature though that is mainly the language style used) so I guess I will go with classic.

 

[Albino Boo]

If it weren't for the whole "Victorian English thing" he did I might be inspired to look into more of his works but relative to my modern surroundings and the literature I'm used to it's bland and needlessly roundabout. I understand everything he writes. That isn't hard at all but I just don't care for his writing style.

Edit: I appreciate his works in a historical sense but not the works themselves.

Err the Victoran era was 1832 to 1901, Shakespeare died in 1616. Its Elizabethan English that is used.

I can see why he's so lauded, although I'm personally not a huge fan of the old-timey style.

Funny thing. Back in his day Shakespeare's works were considered as artless pap to be enjoyed by the uneducated masses, similar to how a lot of people regard Twilight or reality TV in modern times.

Small rather important point, Shakespears's plays were performed at the court of Elizabeth the 1st. The play Richard II was used as part of the Earl of Essex's attempted coup and remained banned for the next 200 years. The modern parallel is more the God Farther or Raging Bull than twilight.

 

[tobi the good boy]

Dude, the guy literally invented the word 'Swagger'.

 

[Baron von Blitztank]

He's ok, but I absolutley LOATHE the writing style.
I've only read Macbeth and already that has put me off from reading any more of that dribble. I only understood what was going on when we watched a film adaptation of the play in class and by looking up plot details online when revising for an essay paper. Sure enough, the story was OK. Infact it's kind of enjoyable. But the writing made things far too irritating to understand and I have no idea who's done what or where they are before the first murder happens

 

[Joccaren]

Have you ever seen Shakespeare performed?

Yes. Two different versions of Romeo and Juliet on video, and 1 live sitting of MacBeth in the replica of the Globe Theatre in London.

 

[Patrick Buck]

Eh, I would call it overrated.
But he's done so much, and added words, and phrases, so he did do well, and did write good plays, but still, Overrated.

 

[Abedeus]

I like him. I like his art. I think Hamlet and Macbeth are my favorite books from that era.

People dislike him because they were force-fed him in school, same reason I hate most of the XIX-XX century Polish literature.