The Number One Reason I Love Teaching Shakespeare (Way Beyond Standards…)

-Ted Tibbetts

I felt almost giddy in the classroom. Clearly, my students could sense it. I was introducing the Shakespeare unit; I’m sure I was gesticulating wildly, talking fast, and perhaps even foaming at the mouth a bit. Cassius would have disapproved. I paused for a breath and one of my students raised her hand.

“Why do you love teaching Shakespeare so much?”

I felt pretty sure I knew the answer; but I started off with the typical, “It’s good for language skills and cultural knowledge and the human condition and…,” but then I stopped.  And told them a story about MaryAnn.

Afterward, wondering if others felt the same, I did some research.  As it turns out, I agree with the Shakespeare teachers out there. I particularly enjoyed Brian Sztabnik’s article “Why I Love Teaching Shakespeare (And You Should Too!)”  He’s spot on when he says that getting up and acting it creates “less of a sedentary place and more of a dynamic environment for learning.”  I couldn’t agree more that the themes foster “sophisticated discussions.” And he even acknowledges that as a student, reading Shakespeare helped him develop his reading confidence.  I would add that the confidence-building extends beyond reading. In fact, it has had the most significant impact on both me and my students.

Here’s the story….

I began using performance strategies for teaching Shakespeare in the mid-1990s.  The strategies had such positive impacts in English class that they spawned a Shakespeare through Performance elective.  Several students participated in a summer Shakespeare program. Then they came back in the fall, went to drama club, came back to me and said, “Drama club’s cool, but it’s not Shakespeare.  What if we had a separate drama club just for Shakespeare?”

Me (out loud)  “Sounds great!”  Me (inner voice) “With three of you?”

We ended up with around 25 students.

This club turned out to be one of the most powerful student groups with which I’ve worked.  In the fall we worked on skill development, ensemble building, and everyone learned a monologue (including me).  In the winter, we cut a play to a 15-minute farce. In the spring we produced a full-length Shakespeare play and the first week of summer vacation we spent at the Royal Shakespeare Company workshopping with RSC actors during the day and attending the theater at night.  It was truly an incredible group with which to work.

MaryAnn joined the club her sophomore year.  Often appearing shy and self-conscious, she struggled to decode text. Once the language anchored itself into her head she was fine, but getting words from the page to her head, then into her voice, was an arduous process.    

That year we produced Much Ado About Nothing.  It was the year Gap had been running the khakis swing dancing commercials, and since it was a post-war play we decided to set it in a post-WWII swing dancing era.  A local music teacher and composer set “Sigh No More” as a swing song (“Hey! Hey! Nonny Nonny, Hey! Hey! Nonny Nonny”) and “Goddess of the Night” as a slow blues tune. MaryAnn’s singing voice made her an excellent fit for Balthasar.  Her performances were beautiful but restrained. I could tell she still felt a bit hesitant.

Her junior year we did Merry Wives of Windsor.  She played Bardolph, still a small role, but one she took seriously.  Kids told me that she never broke character even backstage. It was also this year that I really began to understand how her brain worked.  She still struggled with reading text, but one day I discovered that she possessed outstanding verbal skills.

We were workshopping monologues in a variation of a “dropping in” exercise.  We’d asked her questions about the words in her text designed to provide her with emotional and visual context for her monologue.  Then, she stood up and performed it for us. When she finished, she just stood there. And I knew that she had gone somewhere…hypnotized almost.  We just sat there and waited. “The words….” she stammered and shook her head almost as if to clear the cobwebs. “The words….”

Then came her senior year.  We had decided to perform Henry IV Part 1.  Students had filled out audition sheets and when I got to hers I saw that she wanted to play Falstaff.  

Oh, boy.

So I called her into my office.

“I see that you want to play Falstaff.”

“Yeah, that would be great!”  

“There’s a lot of lines…a lot of memorization.”

“I know.  I know. But I can do it.  I promise.”

“There’s a lot of jokes about size, and..uh….”

“I know.  But I really want to do it.”

Thinking.  (Me). Waiting.  (Her).

“Alright, Let’s do it.” And so began one of the most powerful educational experiences of my life.

As a teacher or a student.

I liked to structure rehearsals like this:  On Monday we would rehearse a scene: work on the language, determine blocking and create characters.  (Only the actors involved in that scene needed to be there.) Then the next scene on Tuesday, maybe a couple of scenes on Wednesday, and so on.  On the last rehearsal of the week, usually Thursday or Friday, the entire cast would come. We would run the scenes we had already rehearsed word for word.  I expected actors to have memorized their lines for those scenes we had already rehearsed. Then, we would improvise the rest of the play. “Tell me the story,” I would shout from the audience.  I loved this part. A bit rocky at first, but week by week these run-throughs grew more and more comic.

MaryAnn came to her first rehearsals with her lines already memorized.  Not perfect, but pretty darn close. Although we never really talked about it, I’m pretty sure that she knew that it would be tough for her to read them and rehearse, so she prepared early.  And the results were astounding. Free from decoding text she found sight-gags and interpretations that went far beyond my creative abilities.

Indeed, she made good on her promise.  She learned all her lines; she created a strong character.  It turned out to be a highly engaging show with comedy, drama, music, and clanging and banging broadsword stage combat.  Word spread. By our last show, we had a packed house. And MaryAnn truly emerged as a star.

She had decided that Falstaff would ALWAYS have a pint of ale in his hand.  At the inn, on the road, and in battle. Late in the play, during a battle scene, Falstaff feigns death, (after carefully setting his ale down lest he spill a few drops) to avoid risking his life fighting Douglas the terrible Scot.  Meanwhile, on the other side of the stage, Hal, the protagonist succeeds in killing Hotspur the Antagonist. After Hal exits, Falstaff gets up and sees Hotspur lying there (after his “the better part of valor is discretion” speech.)  He decides that Hotspur looks scary even dead, and, lest he “counterfeit too and rise” Falstaff decides to stab him to be sure he IS dead. Moreover, even better, he can claim that Hotspur, merely wounded, rose again and that he, Falstaff, ultimately killed him. Again, MaryAnn made a hilarious interpretive choice here saying “Therefore, Sirrah, with a new wound in your…[closing her eyes and stabbing blindly, then looking]…thigh, come you along with me.”

The stage directions then state that Falstaff “Takes up Hotspur on his back.”  Fortunately for us (I’d love to claim that it was brilliant casting on my part but I don’t recall having the forethought for this), a 112-pound champion wrestler played Hotspur, so his athleticism and MaryAnn’s strength made this move possible.  Not only could she pick him up but she could also retrieve her pint of ale in the other hand. Of course….

Prince Hal and other members of the army of re-enter and question Falstaff about Hotspur’s death.  And then comes the stage direction, “Throwing the body down”, but how could Falstaff put him down without spilling the ale?  Once again, Hotspur’s athleticism came into play. Falstaff could heave him from his shoulder, and Hotspur could use stage combat falling technique to protect himself while making the fall look real.

So, as I said, it’s a full house. Most of the audience hadn’t seen the show yet and have no idea this is coming.  MaryAnn heaves Hostpur from her shoulder who falls with a great clamor on the hardwood stage floor. There is a LOUD audible gasp from the audience. I’m pretty sure I heard multiple “Oh my God!”s. MaryAnn stops…looks at the audience, shrugs her shoulders, points to the body and whispers, “He’s dead.”

Uproarious laughter and a standing ovation on the spot!  And I’m choking because my body can’t decide to laugh or cry.  It’s HILARIOUS but I’m wiping away tears because I am so moved by the moment.  This shy, self-conscious, most likely dyslexic student has internalized Shakespeare and the language.  That’s exactly what Falstaff would have said! She has developed confidence. She’s, for the moment, the hero of the play. And I think, “This is why I teach Shakespeare.”

There is no Common Core standard for that. But it’s the most important. And yes, I fully agree that the rigor of Shakespeare’s texts develop literacy and cultural knowledge and…the list goes on.  But performing Shakespeare, even in low key settings of the classroom help build people, not just students.  Yes, there can be some anxiety.  (Anxiety is today what ADHD was in the 90s).   But our students need opportunities to work on overcoming this anxiety.  In a day where educational leaders and community members chant “Rigor!” studying and performing Shakespeare fits the playbill.

Performing Shakespeare builds community in the classroom.  Students learn to trust each other. They bond by overcoming shared challenges. They clap for each other; I clap for them.

Difficult moments will arise.  At the end of the unit, there’s usually at least one student who says, “I was terrified and never want to do it again.”  Others admit, “I was terrified, but I’m so proud of myself for doing it.” Believe it or not, though, a significant additional portion of students clamor, “That was fun, let’s we do it again!”

At that moment, I’m reminded of MaryAnn. I feel myself tearing up, and my students once again wonder what’s wrong with me.