When geeks dream...

[a_t_rain]

I dreamed last night that I discovered the original manuscripts of Hamlet, King Lear, and Macbeth -- and Severus Snape was a character in all of them. His part had to be cut, alas, because he kept turning up with antidotes to subtle poisons and bits of Helpful Advice ("Duncan, you Gryffindor dunderhead, you DON'T arrange to stay at your most ambitious subject's castle the night you make somebody else your heir") -- thus preventing about 90% of the deaths and killing the plot.

Rather than publishing this exciting discovery, my dream-self ran off to write Snape / Cordelia fanfiction. (I can see this pairing, actually. She says undiplomatic things at exactly the wrong time, she leads armies, and I've always thought the Prince of France was a bit of a twit. They'd get along.)

Clearly, I am a total failure as a grad student and I need to get the Potterverse and Shakespeare out of my head.

Comments

[humantales.livejournal.com]

I'm obviously going to have to reread those plays. It's been too many years for me to properly enjoy your dream. ;-)

[winding_path]

Oh, my dear, I am so jealous! What a delightful, delightful dream! (Though, yes, Snape would make most Shakespearean tradegies about an half an act long -- can you imagine the chewing out Romeo would get?)

I never like Cordelia. In my undergrad Shakespeare class, I said everything that happened was her fault, because if she truly loved Daddy, she would have played the game, instead of being all high and mighty about it. (My professor's response? "Miss -----, you have the STRANGEST ideas.")

Still the idea delights me -- and not just for the image of Alan Rickman speaking iambic pentameter . . . .

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

Oh, I like Cordelia, and, as I said, I don't think the King of France deserves her. (It took me several readings to catch the fact that he's basically hanging back to see if her invasion is successful before he comes forward with his troops -- which is no way to treat your allies, let alone your wife.)

But yeah, Snape chewing out Romeo would be hilarious. ("Idiot boy, do you mean to say you don't recognize somebody under the influence of the Draught of Living Death when you see her?")

[winding_path]

I'd never given it much thought before, but you're right about the King of France. (I remember my 11th grade English teacher explaining that there was no way Shakespeare could have written a play in which the English got defeated by the French, even if we all really did want Cordelia to save Lear.)

I suspect turning Snape loose on the Complete Works would prove entertaining, if result in completely unrecognizable plays. It gives me all sorts of ideas for Harry Potter characters doing guest star turns -- Harry and Hamlet trying to out mope each other, Hermione giving Othello insight into Desdemona's mind, Molly bustling around before the battle of Agincort, making sure everyone has tea and a sandwich . . .

[lareinenoire.livejournal.com]

::cracks up:: That has to be the best thing I've heard all day.

Why do I now feel the urge to write Snape into multiple Shakespearean tragedies?

[catkind.livejournal.com]

Your subconscious is a comic genius.

[dolorous-ett.livejournal.com]

Too bad it was just your dream-self doing the writing - I'd love to see those stories!

[moriaravenswood.livejournal.com]

LOL. Someone really, really needs to write some Snape-in-Shakespeare fanfics. (I'd try it myself, but my poetry is-- well-- not up to Shakespeare's level, shall we say?)

I like Cordelia too, even if her stubbornness was a bit excessive. She's such a thorough, sincere idealist (well, that's what I thought when I read the play several years ago, and again when I saw it staged). I never picked up on that detail about the King of France, though-- that's really depressing.

[dizzy-chisel.livejournal.com]

Why on earth would that make you a bad grad student? On the contrary, methinks.

As a teen, I had a hard time "getting" tragedies. I mean, the tragic was supposed to be about an inescapable chain of events, even fate -- that's what my teachers said. But in the ones I read, the tragic outcome was in 60% of the cases the result of communications breakdown -- a lover not telling their beloved that they love them; a tragic hero second-guessing their friends' attitude and not passing on vital information. In another 20%, plain old bad luck prevented a favourable outcome: someone getting delayed and not arriving fast enough, letters going astray...

It got better after reading Sophocles' Antigone, and I'm now able to make allowances for the period's social and sexual mores more than I was at 15 :-).

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

I mean, the tragic was supposed to be about an inescapable chain of events, even fate -- that's what my teachers said. But in the ones I read, the tragic outcome was in 60% of the cases the result of communications breakdown -- a lover not telling their beloved that they love them; a tragic hero second-guessing their friends' attitude and not passing on vital information. In another 20%, plain old bad luck prevented a favourable outcome: someone getting delayed and not arriving fast enough, letters going astray...

See, that's why one should never trust Grand Pronouncements about what any body of literature is "about." I'd say your teenage instincts were spot on.

[angevin2.livejournal.com]

Hee!

Now I can't get the meeting of Snape and Hamlet out of my head...

(A while back, I did a post -- well, it was actually a comment -- which involved sorting the major characters in the history cycle into Hogwarts houses. As you can imagine, the whole thing is dreadfully overloaded with Gryffindors and Slytherins. ;) )