way2go! 7. Coursebook, Schulbuch

100 Unit 06 | The choice is yours Before reading the article below, write in your notebook three ways in which reading classic literature such as Shakespeare benefits your education, and three ways in which it doesn’t help your education. Example: Reading challenging texts expands my vocabulary and benefits my education, but old-fashioned language can’t be used, so doesn’t benefit my education. Read the text about how relevant Shakespeare is. First decide whether the statements (1–6) are true (T) or false (F) and put a cross ( ) in the correct box. Then identify the sentence in the text which supports your decision. Write the first four words of this sentence in the space provided. There may be more than one correct answer; write down only one. The first one (0) has been done for you. READING 28 a b M p. 39 Why Shakespeare still matters Shakespeare would be amused at how famous he is nowadays. Before anything else, he was a businessman: an actor, a shareholder in his company as well as a playwright whose priority was to sell tickets. Half of his plays weren’t even published during his lifetime. Now his legacy is all around us, from The Simpsons and Doctor Who to films such as Shakespeare in Love . Too bad he didn’t live to see the royalties. You don’t have to live in England to see Shakespeare’s influence everywhere you look. Shakespeare is embedded in our history. His plays were performed consistently throughout the 19 th and 20 th centuries and remain some of the most frequently adapted stories in Hollywood. But why should we continue to see Shakespeare’s plays and to read his work? For some, the beauty of his language and the relatable characters he created is enough. His fellow playwright and friend Ben Jonson described Shakespeare as “not of an age, but for all time.” When we think of romance, we think of Romeo and Juliet . When we think of the dangers of ambition or of ruthlessness in politics, we think of Macbeth and Richard III. When a comical mix-up takes place, we still refer to The Comedy of Errors with its confusion of not just one set of twins, but two. Arguably what makes Shakespeare’s work so enduring is that he doesn’t provide easy answers. He does not tell us what to think; he teaches us how to think. His characters and the situations they find themselves in are complex; complex enough to require continued investigation four centuries later. Were Romeo and Juliet’s parents cruel, or were they being responsible and pragmatic in looking after their children’s long-term interests? Should Hamlet have trusted his instinct and acted decisively, or was he wise to delay until he thought he had proof? Or, as King Lear’s decision to divide his land but retain the crown prompts us to consider, does power reside in a title or in actions? There has never been a better time to enjoy Shakespeare. The Bard’s enduring popularity proves that even four centuries after his death, he can teach us much about dealing with humanity’s great questions. The questions of identity, race, terror, sex, violence, religion and gender raised by Shakespeare’s plays continue to be hotly debated in contemporary culture, though rarely with the subtlety and intelligence found in Shakespeare. In wrestling with the provocative questions and scenarios Shakespeare created, we question our own assumptions and beliefs, clarify our own thoughts, and become better thinkers. And as the vast diversity of film and stage performances suggests, we continue to have fun in the process. Nur zu Prüfzwecken – Eigentum des Verlags öbv