The good news is that I have in fact been continuing with the Shakespeare stuff, the “remedial accumulation of cultural capital”). I just, for various reasons, haven’t been putting up posts. So, over the next few days, you will get Measure for Measure, All’s Well That Ends Well, Merry Wives of Windsor, As You Like It and (deep breath) The Comedy of Errors.
Then, in the rest of July I am going to read (and blog) The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Love’s Labour’s Lost, Much Ado About Nothing, A Winter’s Tale, Twelfth Night and Two Noble Kinsmen. That will then set me up for doing the history plays and that will do for Shakespeare, for a while at least (there will be a handful of plays where I still rate my knowledge as “low”, but idgaf.)
King John – Glorious-ish Bastard!
Year written: 1595
Context of the writing (Shakespeare’s career, political events it was responding to): xx
Plot in a paragraph: King John faces a whole lotta challenges and challengers. Things get better, worse, better, worse. A young child is almost tortured and murdered, and then genuinely “die while trying to escape.” An offstage poisonous monk does for King John, who doesn’t even have the most lines in his own play! (loser!)
Things that worked well: the double-crossings, the reversals of fortune etc
Things that didn’t work well: Arthur‘s fall from grace, obviously.
Favourite character: no contest – the Bastard!
Words I learnt:
| Word | Definition |
| Supernal | Supernal – heavenly, celestial |
| Scroyles | Scroyles – wretch, scoundrel |
| Mutines | Mutines – rebel, or rebellion |
| Peised | Peised – weighed/measured |
| Recreant | Recreant – cowardly, unfaithful |
| Cincture | Cincture – The cincture is a rope-like or ribbon-like article sometimes worn with certain Christian liturgical vestments, encircling the body around or above the waist. A |
| Welkin | Welkin – sky, heaven |
| Cresset | Cresset – A cresset is a metal cup or basket, often mounted to or suspended from a pole, containing oil, pitch, a rope steeped in rosin or something flammable. They are burned as a light or beacon. |
Lines worth knowing:
| Act scene lines | Character | Lines | Comment |
| Act 1, scene 1, line 28 | King John | “Be thou the trumpet of our wrath and sullen presage of your own decay” | |
| Act 2, scene 1, line 97 | King Philip | Outfaced infant state | |
| Act 2, scene 1, line 279 | King John | Calm words, folded up in smokeTo make a faithless error in your ears | |
| Act 2, scene 2, line 12 | Constance | For I am sick and capable of fears | |
| Act 3, scene 1, line 270 | King Philip | “Thy rage shall burn thee up, and thou shalt turn to ashes ere our blood shall quench that fire. Look to thyself, thou art in jeopardy | |
| Act 3, scene 4, line 178-180 | Pandolf | Tis wonderful what may be wrought out of their discontent now that their souls are top-full of offence. | |
| Act 3, scene 4, line 182 | Louis | Strong reasons make strange actions | |
| Act 4, scene 2, line 11 | Salisbury | To gild refined gold, to paint the lily | |
| Act 4, scene 2, line 53 | Pembroke | “Doth move the murmuring lips of discontent” | |
| Act 4, scene 2, line 104-5 | King John | There is no sure foundation set on blood, No certain life achieved by others’ death | |
| Act 4, scene 2, line 133 – 4 | King John | Do not seek to stuff My head with more ill news, for it is full. | |
| Act 4, scene 2, line 144-6 | Bastard | I find the people strangely fantasisedPossessed with rumours, full of idle dreams,Not knowing what they fear, but full of fear. | |
| Act 4, scene 2, line 209-10 | King John | It is the curse of kings to be attended By slaves that take their humours for a warrant To break within the bloody house of life, And on the winking of authority To understand a law, to know the meaning of dangerous majesty | |
| Act 4, scene 2, line 220-1 | King John | How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds Make deeds ill done! | “If you have a hammer” |
| Act 4, scene 3, line 26 | Salisbury | We will not line his thin bestained cloak with our pure honours, nor attend the foot that leaves the print of blood where’er it walks. | |
| Act 4, scene 3, line 108-110 | Salisbury | Reat not those cunning waters of his eyes, For villainy is not without such rheum, And he, long traded in it, makes it seem Like rivers of remorse and innocency. | |
| Act 4, scene 3, line 155 | Bastard | The imminent decay of wrested pomp. | |
| Act 5, scene 4, line 52 | Salisbury | We will untread the steps of damned flight | |
| Act 5, scene 6, line 21 | Hubert | Black, fearful, comfortless and horrible |
Marc’s entirely subjective verdict and score out of 5 bards (ymmv): 4
Will I be tracking down movies of this? : yes
How far would I travel to see a good production of this? London?
Limericks
The cunning and crafty King John
With the French is battling on
He gets quite a fillip
From a bastard – called Philip
Who’s with him ‘til his crown is gone
A war with France is John embracing
Against defeat he is o’er-racing
He gets too “Darth”-er
In “killing” nephew Arthur
And adds to the shit he’s facing
King John isn’t much of a chooser
He fights not at heavy but cruiser
Then he falls in a funk
And is offed by a monk
With less* lines than a Bastard, the loser!
(It scans better than “fewer” – so sue me)
UPDATE
What other people think:
Orwell rated it as his favourite Shakespeare play (though he wasn’t a huge fan)/.
Books/chapters/articles I might try to track down:
Xx
Podcasts and their contents
| Date | Podcast | Episode title | Topic | Length | Score out of ten (ymmv) | Comments |
| No Holds Bard | 9 | |||||
| Approaching Shakespeare | 10 | Super useful way of looking at it all, via the figure of Arthur | ||||
| Not true but useful | ||||||
| Bard Files | ||||||
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